Soul
by PhantomTigre
Summary: Finally a sequal to Dungeon! Hermione and Draco are finally free from Voldemort and back at Hogwarts, what happens now? Did Voldemort die? What about their relationship and getting over their ordeal? RR.
1. Chapter One

Friday Night 1:23 am

Hermione Granger sat up in the hospital wing bed screaming. Almost immediately everyone there woke up. The paintings cried out soothing words. Then all was silent. A moment later the lights flicked on to reveal Draco Malfoy at her side holding onto her hand. 

"Hermione?" he asked softly then assured her, "It's alright. It was only a nightmare."

The color slowly came back to her face and she closed her eyes biting her lip. A single tear made its way down her cheek. Draco sat down on her bed next to her pulling her into a tight hug. She hugged him back burying her face into his chest. 

"It's alright," he murmured absentmindedly stroking her hair. Madame Pomfrey came in and ushered Draco back into his bed giving them both dreamless sleep potions. Then she flicked off the lights and left once again.

Saturday Morning 9:03 am

Light shone uncomfortably into Draco's face. He slowly opened his eyes surprised to find himself in a warm comfortable bed near a large window. He smiled remembering they'd finally gotten away or been rescued. No more sleeping on straw. It would not be hard to get used to a soft bed again. He sat up groaning slightly and flexing his shoulders. He winced when he leaned forward, remembering the burns on his stomach. They'd probably leave scars. Surprisingly though, he felt better than he had in a long time. He silently thanked the medical wizards and their healing potions and spells. 

Finally he stood up walking over to the window. He pushed it open letting the warm spring air wash over him. It was early April, and though there was still some snow on the ground the air was mostly warm. They'd completely missed Winter during there 'stay' in the dungeons of the Dark Lord. Draco didn't mind though, he hated Winter. Too cold. Looking at Hermione he saw she was still peacefully asleep. They'd both gotten baths, thankfully, and her skin was pale from her prolonged stay in the dark. They were both horribly underweight though, something Draco had not noticed in the dimness of the dungeons.

He gingerly touched the bandage around his head and looked down to see his chest wrapped in bandages as well. Were his injuries really that bad? He moved slightly and felt a sharp pain shoot down stomach. He'd felt like he'd been getting better before, but then he had been, compared to how bad he had been originally. 

Draco sat back down on the bed and glanced at the clock. It was already 9. He wondered if they'd still be serving breakfast down in the great hall. If they weren't oh well, he wasn't that hungry any way. All of his aches and pains made his appetite rather small, and he wasn't used to having lots to eat anyway. 

Several clean robes and underclothing were folded neatly at the end of his bed. He pulled on the pants and switched the pajama shirt for the clean one. Then he slipped into his robe. He wished he had a wand with him, his wand was now under tons of dirt. He'd have to find time to go to London and get a new one. 

Walking down the hallways Draco felt strange, as though he should be edging along the walls, and it was too bright, the death eaters would easily see him. He shook his head trying to push away and forget the awful memories and slowly the feeling of being watched and followed subsided. He shivered once then continued down the hallways finally reaching the great hall. He was surprised he still remembered the way around, but things like complicated passages that you had to remember to make it classes on time, were the kind of things one did not forget easily. Luckily there were still several teachers and students eating breakfast. He had no idea what day of the week it was, school might even have been canceled for a few days to a week or so because of the whole dungeons incident. Or it could just be a weekend. He'd lost so much time in his life. Draco realized though, that if none of it had ever happened, he wouldn't of gone through the changes he had. He'd still be the dark side rules son of a death eater bully. What was going to happen now? 

As he looked around the great hall he suddenly didn't feel like eating and headed outside sitting down on the grass beneath a tree. His father was dead, who knows what had happened to Malfoy Manor? Draco pulled his knees up to his chest suddenly feeling cold. He heard the whisper of the wind in the leaves and was surprised when it startled him. He glanced around and his eyes landed on the dense trees of the beginning of the forbidden forest.

Draco bit his lip suddenly feeling the urge to run, he had to get away from here, back somewhere safe, not out in the open like this, what is some of the death eaters had survived, surely not all of them were down in the caves when the collapse happened, they could still be out there. There was still so much evil out there, it wasn't even guaranteed that You-Know-Who was dead, they hadn't seen him die. Draco stood up quickly and ran back across the grounds pushing the doors quickly and stepping inside. As the doors slid shut with a soft thump Draco breathed then leaned against them sliding to the floor. _What was wrong with him? _He'd panicked, like a small child, afraid of the dark. Resisting the urge to shiver he headed back up the hallways to the infirmary, he assumed he'd be staying there while his wounds healed, he could feel the scabs pulling at his skin as he walked, but the pain was so dull compared to what it had been before, he felt so much better.


	2. Chapter Two

Saturday Morning 9:45 am

Back in the infirmary he poured himself a cup of water from the pitcher then sat down on his bed to stare out the window. So perfect and sunny and happy out there, or so it seemed. Hermione's bed was empty, which must mean she had gotten up. He felt the strong urge to see her, know where she was and that she was safe. Unless they'd moved her to another room, but why would they do that. He glanced down the row of beds, most of them were filled and had curtains around them. Not of all the patients here were hogwarts students either, since they had so much room Hogwarts was taking care of other prisoners that had been trapped down there. 

At the moment Madame Pomfrey came in and he looked up asking, "Is Hermione, I mean, did you move her or, is she somewhere?"

"She was moved to a private room dear," she replied wondering briefly at the politeness in Draco's voice.

"May I see her, is she alright?" Draco asked worry starting to flood him.

"Her injuries are pretty badly infected, you're both dehydrated and have lost lots of blood, sustained severe blows to the body, and third degree burns. You actually are much better off, your burns had already started healing, and no infection has set in. We're worried about Shock setting in though," Madame Pomfrey explained, "I suppose you may go and see her for a little bit though, I believe she is awake right now. Don't make her upset though."

Draco bit his lip feeling slight resentment at it being assumed he didn't want to see her just to see if she was alright. Then again, he had to remember what he'd been like before. Now he wanted to be better and wanted to fix his faults, which, though many were still there, at least he wanted to be a good person. Standing up carefully he walked into the room Madame Pomfrey had indicated.

She smiled when she saw Draco and he smiled back feeling his heart lift a little. She was pale and her skin was a bit blue around her lips. Draco came over and sat down on the bed beside her taking her hand and giving a soft squeeze. Her skin was cool against his own warm hands. 

"We've missed so much," she said softly.

"I can't help but worry, what if he's still out there, what if the rocks didn't kill him?" Draco wondered putting an arm around her waist and pulling her closer.

Hermione remained silent, then spoke up, "I feel like I should be happy, and I am, to be free, out of there, but I can't help but feel like this happiness can't last, and what he did down there, what those people did down there, you could hardly call them people, they're inhuman, they don't have hearts at all. All I can feel is anger."

Draco closed his eyes softly trying not to relive it all over again, and he suddenly felt tired. He turned and kissed her softly then said, "I think I'm going to sleep some more, make up for all the sleep I lost down there."

Hermione nodded then leaned back in her bed, "You're right, I feel tired too, even though I only woke up a little bit ago."

Draco nodded then lifted his hand to touch her forehead softly then to brush her hair out of her eyes, "Are you alright? Do you feel alright?"

"I'm fine," Hermione assured him, but her eyes showed worry hidden behind them.

"Madame Pomfrey is worried about Shock," Draco stated.

"Don't worry, I can get over this," Hermione said.

"Okay," he said and stood up, "I'll let you get your rest then."

"I love you," she said as he turned to leave.

"I love you too," he said and leaned down to give her one more quick kiss before he left the room. 

Saturday Evening 6:55 pm

Draco woke up feeling the last rays of the sun disappear over the horizon. He'd slept all day, Draco didn't know if he could ever recall sleeping this much. According to the nurses he'd previously lept three days straight. His stomach growled and he realized he was ravenous. 

He sat up in his bed, once again too quickly, and his bandages pulled and he tried hard not to wince, but didn't succeed, as pain shot throughout him. He moaned slightly as he eased himself into a fully sitting position. His injuries, hurt just as much, if not more, than they had that morning. What if they never healed? Of course, that was ridiculous, they'd heal, but most likely leaving dreadful scares to tell stories about to his children and grandchildren. That thought of course made him think of Hermione. Would he one day be married to her, long out of Hogwarts, living their lives? Maybe one day, but not today, they were both far too young for marriage, nor did he feel like he was even close to ready for marriage. He could see himself loving Hermione forever... but someone how forever and marriage didn't quite connect.

One of the nurses came over seeing that he was awake, closing the curtains around the bed of a patient she'd just been tending.

"I see your awake Mr. Malfoy," she said, "Your bandages need changing and cleaning, so if you'll come with me?"

Draco nodded and carefully swung his legs over the side of the bed, the nurse made to help him but he shook his head and stood up. The nurse sighed then started walking away, motioning for him to follow. She led him into one of several rooms that had a very clean feeling to it, inside was a young doctor. Hogwarts, as well as helping many survivors, had also hired nurses and a few doctors.

The doctor grinned as Draco entered and told the nurse she could leave now. Then he turned his attention to Draco.

"So, how are you feeling?" he asked as Draco sat down on the white 'bed'. 

"Better," Draco replied.

"Good, I'm just gonna change your bandages, clean you up, and give you a check-up," the doctor explained.

"Okay," Draco said wondering if the changing and cleaning would hurt. 

  
  



	3. Chapter Three, real boring titles huh?

Wednesday Afternoon 2: 56 pm

Draco sat in the back of the Potions class room, feeling rather behind on things. The teachers all assured him he'd do fine and said they'd just pick of his grades right where they left off, he wouldn't have to do any make-up work unless he really wanted to, and he could always attend a summer school to catch up. 

He scribbled down notes thinking absentmindedly his dad would kill him if he failed. Then he remembered, his dad wasn't there any more. He bit his lip, it felt strange, to be without him, no one to boss him around anymore. He could do whatever he wanted, he didn't have to get good grades. Yet, he still wanted to do at least reasonably well in his classes, he wanted to get a good job that he enjoyed once he was out of Hogwarts, maybe go on to a magical college. What had happened to his mother though, was she running Malfoy Manor by herself now, or had something happened to her. Though he'd never been close to his mother, he'd never really hated her too much either. She was the one who had stopped his father many times from nearly beating him to death. 

Finally, to Draco's relief the bell rang and Draco hurried out of the class room. Professor Snape had lectured them all fiercely today on the difference between white mushrooms, and almost nearly white mushrooms, with very faint off-white spots. During the lesson he'd noticed that Professor Snape really did kind of pick on Harry, of course Harry could have thought a little harder, but none the less. Draco purposely made a similar mistake and found himself only told what he'd done wrong and corrected. 

Draco gathered up his things and left the room, he dropped his things off at the common room before heading to the infirmary. Several people had already gone back to their homes, others were bad enough they were still in separate rooms. Herimone, to Draco's dismay, was still in a private one. He pushed open the door to her room to first see Harry and Ron there and second to see that Hermione still wasn't any better. She had, despite all attempts to prevent it, gone into Shock. She was sleeping right now, but had been in pretty bad condition the past few days. Only 2 days ago had Draco started classes, Hermione had been in shock for 4 days now. According to the doctor that was in charge of her she was in Psychogenic Shock, which was a type of shock caused from a traumatic situation. 

At that moment the doctor came in and checked her vital signs and frowned, he glanced at Harry, Ron, and Draco and looked as though he was going to send them out, then thought better of it.

He smiled slightly and said, "You're her friends?"

They all nodded, each with almost identical expressions of worry. Draco caught Harry glance at him, probably wondering what the hell he was doing here. 

"When she wakes up, she'll be needing you," he said then left the room. 

Draco glanced over at Harry and Ron who were both looking at him suspiciously. He resisted the urge to snap at them for immediately assuming that he was here for some non-nice reason.

"What?" he asked in a rather annoyed voice.

"You," Ron said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. Which it probably was, Draco was expecting this. He knew he'd have to learn to be nice, maybe even become friends with them both, you can't love someone's best friend without caring for them too. 

"Yes, _me,_" Draco said wishing they'd just get to the point.. they could at least try to be friendly. Yet, he had never been friendly to them, they really had no reason to even try to be nice now. Sighing he closed his eyes trying to relax, it was easier when it was just him and Hermione, making the decision to change was easy, doing the actual changing was going to hard. 

"Sorry," he said first finding it a very hard word to say, he didn't think he could ever remember a time he'd said it, except maybe when he was begging his father. Draco realized he really hated his father, when he'd been alive, he hadn't really been able to hate his father, he was punished and brought up in a way that his father was master, hating him wasn't an option. Draco realized that all along in his years at Hogwarts, he'd acted very much like his father... it was no wonder people hated him. Also he'd never thought of it as people hating him, more like people being weaker than him, he was the strong one... 

Draco was jerked out of his thoughts when Harry coughed. They were both staring at him like he was the angel of death arriving in a flaming carriage from the depths of hell to tell Harry and Ron he was sorry.

"You're sorry?" Harry managed to choke out.

"Yes," Draco replied, "For, bullying you I guess. You hate me and you have reason to, but that doesn't mean we can all change."

"Ah," Ron said apparently having trouble understanding what Draco was saying.

"Why should we believe you?" Harry asked suddenly, "What are you doing here anyway? We _do_ have a reason to hate you, and we also have no reason to trust you!"

Draco's eyes narrowed as he felt the old anger for them both well up, for Harry especially. The arrogant kid that he was. He gave this impression he didn't want to be famous, but he'd never follow though with it! They were both so sheltered, each with their own problems, it was their own problems that mattered and no one else.. selfish, spoiled by fame without realizing it, so eager for glory and popularity. 

"Okay, you know what, I'll just leave," Draco said, "If you're gonna be like this. I have all the right to be here, did it even occur to you that _I_ was down there too, with Hermione? I know her, I worry about her too."

Harry and Ron's face showed disbelief and Draco sneered then stormed out the room. He strode down the hallways and left the castle through a side door. It wasn't until he reached the lake that his anger cooled and he sat down to think about it. 

The chances of Harry and Ron forgiving him right away were as slim as Draco suddenly forgiving his father. They'd acted the way anybody would act. Yes, they were a little immature and selfish, but who wasn't? He had to look at them as equals.. they weren't beneath him. Draco had gotten so used to thinking of himself as better than everyone else, it would be hard to break the habit. 

  


A/N: Thanks everyone for reviewing! I was really worried this sequel wouldn't get any reviews! To you guys who haven't read Dungeon, this is the sequel to it, so you might want to read Dungeon then read this. 

I'd like to dedicate this chapter to all yon faithful reviewers!

regina-terrae

duochang97

fairylightbabe89

LiLbLueangel1223

Marissa03

dracohermioneluver

basalm

  
  
  
  



	4. New Girl

Thursday Morning 5:43

Draco woke up to find himself sitting in a hard wooden chair in a dark room. Panicking he stood up half expecting to feel his wrists and ankles bound to the chair. After a moment he remembered where he was and as his eyes adjusted to the dark he made out the form of Hermione sleeping in the small bed. He'd fallen asleep watching her. Yesterday evening he come back hours after charging out of the room. Harry and Ron had already left so he'd simply sat down in the chair to wait. Glancing up to the small window he saw the it was either night or very early morning. He blinked once then sat back down disliking the feeling one gets when he has slept in his clothes. 

His stomach growled loudly, reminding him he had skipped dinner. Sighing he stood up wondering if breakfast would be served. If it was 6, it probably would be, he knew many teachers got up at that time, if it was earlier than 6, probably not. If only the bloody school would hang clocks up everywhere!

Sighing he walked towards the door and opened it then turned back to look at Hermione and murmured, "Sweet dreams my love."

He walked down the hallways praying he wouldn't bump into something in the darkness, or get caught under the charges of wandering around planning to cause mischief. Looking at his record, it was likely he wouldn't even be questioned, just punished and sent to the Slytherin dormitory. Despite his wanting to be better, he still didn't think of Slytherins as bad. Yes, some were bullies, but not all of them. Most people discriminated against all houses and slytherin was no exception. The definition of slytherins was not 'bad'. It would be the outgoing, the daring, the kind of people that are dare devils, athletes, or self-employment people. The kind of person who forms their own band to make a living, the people who simply aren't afraid do to what it takes. Also the kind of person who can be ruthless at times, but all for the good in the end. Or even the kind of person who is just kind of punk, nice, but creative and crazy. 

He reached the Great Hall uneventfully and entered to see a single person sitting at the Ravenclaw table. He headed for the Slytherin table, then shrugged and walked over to sit across from the person. As he sat down he looked at her and decides he had no idea who she was. She was surprisingly pretty with soft lips, a small nose, and a stubborn chin. Her eyes were dark yet spirited and alive. She had short cropped black hair and a thoughtful expression on as she sipped at a cup of unidentifiable liquid.

She looked up as Draco sat down and gave a slight smile then said, "Hey. Another early riser or what?"

"Realized I hadn't eaten dinner, slept in a chair beside a bed in the infirmary," he explained then asked, "Are they serving food this early?"

"Yeah they are," she said ignoring his first statement, "The house elves act like waiters instead of magicking the food though, takes less energy."

"Ah," Draco said realizing he'd never known this. Then again he'd never been up at such a unholy hour in his entire life. 

"I can call one for you," she said giving a small smile then pausing to look at him with a studying expression.

Draco looked down then away a little embarrassed, "No, that's alright. I can order myself, or at least I could last time I tried."

She chuckled then turned her attention back to her drink. Draco looked around for any house elves then waved to one that was clearing some plates from the Slytherin table.

"So, I don't believe we've met," Draco said trying to start a conversation as the house elf eagerly ran over.

"May I take Master's order?" the elf asked looking up at him with 'eager to please' eyes.

"Uh, yeah," Draco said, "I'd like fried eggs, toast, bacon, and some orange juice," he said and the elf quickly took note of this then disappeared with a crack.

"You sound hungry," she said then added, "By the way, I'm Sen."

"That's a nice name," he replied absentmindedly, "I'm Draco, I'm not a ravenclaw just if you want to know, but I figured, since you're the only one here..."

"Yeah. What year are you in?" she asked finishing up her drink and pushing the drink off to the side.

"My seventh," he replied, "I'm probably going to have to take this year over though. You can't miss so many months and expect to graduate. Of course, I was thinking of going to summer school to make it all up, but whatever."

"Miss so many months?" Sen asked curiously her attention turning away from her drink, now that it was gone, to him.

"Er, yeah," Draco said wishing he hadn't said anything, "I was one of the people Voldemort captured..."

"Really?" she asked her eyes widening, "That's interesting. Did he, like, do anything to you?"

"Besides torture and starve me?" he asked with maybe a bit too much sarcasm.

Sen grinned and glanced up as the magicked ceiling of the great hall lit up as the sky turned from night to day.

"Do you have any scars?" she asked bluntly then blushed, "Sorry, that's kind of rude. I mean, are you okay?"

Draco smiled slightly and wondered briefly if he'd made a friend, "I'm fine, I've gotten over it, I do have scars though."

He then realized he was lying when he said he'd gotten over it, because he hadn't not fully, and didn't know if he ever was. Nightmares tormented his sleep and he had trouble with things like waking up in the dark and being alone. He shivered slightly disliking the paranoid feelings. 

"I won't ask you to show them to me," Sen said. The house elf reappeared with a steaming plate of toast and eggs, crisp bacon, and a cup of orange juice. Looking around the hall Draco realized a few other people had arrived, all of them also no one he knew.

"Okay," Draco said, "I probably wouldn't have shown them even if you asked."

Sen smiled and looked down then back up as she glanced around the great hall and said, "I should be leaving soon."

Draco nodded and stood up, "I should move back to my table."

"Hey, Draco?" Sen said, "You interested in meditating and psychic stuff?"

"I never thought about it," he said truthfully.

"Well, I have an after class club, want to check it out?" she asked.

Draco paused then nodded, "Yeah, it sounds neat."

"Great," she said then stood up as well, "Its in Firenze's class room, in the evening, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays."

"Okay," Draco said, "See you then."

A/N: I totally forgot about Hermione's parents! Ah, thought I was thinking of everything! Thanks for reminding me! I'll see if I can add them in, or at least mention them.

dracohermioneluver

distelMalfoy

Earwen Colomanel

Shannon

Marrisa03

Lady Lanet

LiLbLueangeL1223

duochang97

Riddleness

ghypscee

Oh yeah, if want to receive email updates.. Just mention that in your review. If you do already from me, and don't want to, just reply with the subject Remove. 


	5. Venus Fly Traps

Thursday Lunch 12:11 pm 

Draco looked up as Harry entered Hermione's room and frowned. Harry proceeded to ignore him which Draco decided was for the better. Hermione's parents had arrived earlier and Draco had tried to sneak out when they proceeded to interrogate him. Why was he here? What was his relationship to Hermione? What was his relationship with Mr. Potter? It was lunch break and Draco had eaten very quickly in order to spend time with Hermione. Her parents had left after a bit to go talk to Dumbledore or someone. When Hermione was awake she was always shivery in a way and kind of closed up. He'd take her hand and talk to her softly and recently she'd gradually calmed down, eventually falling back asleep. 

He stood up as Harry entered then sat back down. There was no noise except for Harry sitting down in the other chair and pulling it up next to Hermione's bed by Draco.

"Malfoy," he said softly, not wanting to disturb Hermione, "I've been thinking. You must have went through something down there, I mean I know Hermione did, and you were there too, so I just want to say, I'm sorry too. I can be a real idiot sometimes."

Draco raised his eyebrows in surprise, so the boy had some sense in him after all, and he did know he was an idiot, sometimes. 

"Call me Draco," he replied, "Malfoy was my father's name, I'm not my father."

"Draco," Harry said.

"I don't want to be like my father," Draco told Harry, wondering briefly if he should keep calling him Potter or Harry and then decided that if he was going to be friends with him they should switch to a first name basis, "Harry, I had lots of time to think down there and my father was a real ass."

"Ah," Harry said. Draco said nothing in reply and they both sat silently until it was time for them to head off to their afternoon classes.

Draco stood up and pushed open the door with Harry following behind outside Ron was walking down the hallway towards Hermione's room. 

"Hey Ron," Harry called then said when he got closer, "It's a little late for visiting Hermione, classes are just about to start."

It was then Draco noticed Ron had a odd look on his face, and he looked strangely pale. He walked right up to Harry then put his hands around Harry's throat. 

"Ron!" Harry said, "What are doing?"

Ron said nothing and instead stared coldly as Harry coughed. Draco grabbed onto Ron to try to pull him off Harry. When that didn't work, and Harry was starting to turn blue, Draco tried to loosen Ron's grip to no success. Finally he kicked him as hard as he got. Ron made a coughing noise then let go and stepped back looking dazed. 

Harry fell to the floor and coughed a few times then took several deep breaths. Draco kneeled down to see if Harry was alright then heard Ron mumble something that sounded like a spell and felt a cool breeze of air rush past him. He stood up and looked at Ron.

"What do you think you were doing?" Draco asked angrily, "And I thought you two were supposed to be friends, I know I've felt like doing that plenty of times myself but I never have!"

"What I was doing?" Ron asked looking at Draco angrily as he knelt down to help Harry up, "Come on Harry."

Harry stood up and looked at Draco coldly, "I thought you said you were sorry. Apparently you aren't."

"What?!" Draco asked now thoroughly confused.

"Don't play stupid, you nearly strangled me, then when Ron tried to help you kicked him!" Harry said fiercely then turned and walked down the hallway with Ron following. Ron glanced back once and Draco saw his eyes were all black. He shivered then mouthed something to Ron he'd never say out loud at Hogwarts. Ron turned back around and followed Harry down the hallway.

Confused and angry Draco walked down the hallway in the opposite direction, resisting the urge to punch something. Just great, he was trying to be helpful and they both turned on him. Which was very confusing considering Harry believed Draco had done the strangling. when, it was Ron. Well, that's the way Gryfindors were, unpredictable. 

As he hurried to class his thoughts wandered once again to You-Know-Who. Was he dead, was he alive? If he was alive where was he? At least they were safe now, here at Hogwarts.

Thursday Afternoon 2:30 pm

In Herbology class he bumped into Crabbe and Goyle who made ape like gestures and grunts then looked at him.

"You're back in classes?" Goyle asked, except it was more like a statement than a question.

"Yeah, I am," Draco said, "I was in class all morning too." 

Draco decided against telling them he'd also been in class since Monday, but decided against it. Some friends he had.

"Oh," Goyle said blankly. Draco suddenly wondered why he hung out with the two goons. They were stupid as hell and offered no company. They did like bullying people though, that had probably been why. 

"Listen, I don't like you two," Draco said, "I don't really want to hang out with you. You can just be friends with each other. You don't need me."

They both stared stupidly and Draco sighed then turned around and walked off. At the other end of the green house he stopped and wonder briefly what he had just done. He had just dumped the only two 'friends' he'd ever had. Were they really friends though or side kicks? Had he ever had _friends_? Hermione was the first person he could ever remember wanting to spend time with, simply because he liked her.

Draco wondered what people would do when the news got out they were together. Unless they just didn't tell anyone. Thinking of Hermione Draco felt worry wash over him. People always got over Shock right? You couldn't die from it could you? She wouldn't die though, not after surviving all that down in the Dungeons. 

As he shoved some meat down the Venus fly trap's mouth he suddenly felt the urge to just skip class and go see her. He truly couldn't miss any more classes though. There would be time in between classes to go see her though. 

What if though, now that they were back at Hogwarts, she'd stop loving him? What if she'd start hating him again and get some gryfindor boyfriend? He bit his lip, but he doubted that would happen, she wasn't that type of person. She was a Gryfindor, Gryfindors didn't do that... they were the kind of person who were _good_ just for the sake of being good. They didn't do it for themselves, only to help others. Slytherins, Ravenclaws, and Hufflepuffs could be _good_ and nice, but Draco didn't think he could ever quite get that whole good thing. One could be nice and caring and worry about the environment and donate to various places yet, it wasn't the same some how. No matter what happened though, Draco would always be there for her, no matter what he'd do anything for her, always follow her through everything. Lord and Lady, he loved her so much! She was the most amazing person he'd ever known with the amazing ability to _think_ no matter what was going on. Smart and beautiful and loving and simply perfect. Every day he felt as though he was falling even more in love with her.

Draco suddenly felt a fierce pain stab into his pinky finger and looked down to see the Venus Fly trap biting his finger and he swore rather loudly. A few people looked at him and snickered and Draco looked down then carefully removed his finger from the thing's mouth then quickly replaced his finger with the food they were supposed to be feeding it. 

A/N: Thanks for reviewing everyone! Maybe this story will live up to its uh.. what's the word.. prequel? Also, I won't mind if you tell you're friends how wonderful Dungeon and Soul! :-P

I'd like to dedicate this chapter to the following reviewers:

Ashley Nikole Malfoy

Earwen Colomanel

Cereza

dracohermioneluver

Marissa03

Also, I had comments about Sen. She does have a role.. I suppose I could have used a old character, but it wouldn't have fit. I know most of the time stories with new people don't work.. So just bear with me if you don't like her.. I'd like to thank Marissa03, your review really um.. *searches for word* encouraged me.. I was really worried the new girl thing wouldn't work at all.

  
  
  
  
  



	6. Possessed

Thursday Afternoon 3:06 pm

Draco pushed open the door to Hermione's room once again and smiled seeing she was awake. 

"Good afternoon love," he said sitting down next to her. 

She seemed to only partly acknowledge his presence and smiled weakly. Then she shivered and pulled the blankets up closer. The doctors had told him to be patient and calm. That he should just talk to her, make sure she's comfortable. 

"Well apparently your blood vessels dilated or something," Draco said with a slight smile, "It because of your emotional experience, that made it set in. It could happen to anyone. Happened to a lot of warlocks during the days of You-Know-Who, when he first rose. You were under a lot of strain down there, we all were and I know you'll pull out of this."

Draco continued on talking for another then minutes before he had to leave to make it to his next class. He said goodbye then left, softly shutting the door behind him and going to his last class for the day.

Thursday Evening 7:00 pm

Draco hesitantly pushed open the door to Firenze's classroom, where the psychic class was to be. The classroom was designed to be like you were outdoors. It even smelled like he was outdoors. One could easily be convinced they were really were outdoors if they didn't know the classroom was in the middle of Hogwarts on the first floor. He walked past a few trees to the little clearing in the center where a couple other people and Sen sat. Draco also noted, to his dismay, Harry and Ron were also there. He hoped they'd be over the noon happenings by now.

Harry and Ron were talking about something while Sen sat organizing some notes. He glance at Harry and Ron, and Ron glanced at him giving him a cold stare. Apparently they were still evil. Draco shivered wondering if Ron was alright, the black eye thing was giving him the creeps, and Harry didn't even seem to notice. What if he was going crazy?

Shrugging he walked over to Sen turning away from Harry and Ron. The hairs on the back his neck stood up and he got the odd feeling someone was going to stab him in the back. He stepped aside and turned around just as something did, or almost did. A bolt of magical fire zipped into the trees making a perfect hole through one of them. It then hit the walls of the room and dispersed into nothing. 

Draco raised his eyebrows then turned and looked in the direction of the bolt. Ron stood their cooly, a second ball of fire gathering in between his hands. Harry stood their, seemingly oblivious looking up at the sky and humming a song. Draco gaped then glanced at Sen, she had stood up abruptly and was staring at Ron.

"Quick, grab him Draco!" she yelled and Draco surprised started towards Ron, but then stopped. Was it wise to grab someone who was holding magical fire in their hands. 

"He's possessed!" she yelled, "I'll block the fire!"

Draco missed the possessed part but understood the block part and ran towards Ron as he threw another bolt at Draco. Almost instantly a blue waterish bolt hit the fire one and the fire one, evaporated. Draco looked at it stunned then ran in Ron knocking him down. He immediately started struggling, but Draco was larger and stronger. Sen came over a moment later and sat down folding her legs then closed her eyes. A moment later Ron stopped struggling. Draco stepped away, then sat down next to Sen.

"I put a binding spell on his soul," she said in answer to what he was just about to ask, "You can't do that normally, but since its not _his_ soul that was in control, all you have to do is freeze the body and it renders the soul immobile. If he weren't possessed it wouldn't have worked."

"Ah," Draco said simply then said, "You really are into the whole psychic/meditating thing then, you weren't just kind of theorizing."

Sen grinned, "My parents taught me, they thought it was very important I know this stuff. Its hard though, have you ever lucid dreamed?"

"Never heard of it," Draco replied.

"Its when you know you are dreaming and therefore can do whatever you want. So you make something appear, you fly, change the setting, but its mentally hard to do, the smaller the thing, the easier, larger, like setting is hard, you have to _think_ about it really hard to get it to work," Sen explained.

"Oh," Draco said surprised, he'd never given much thought to dreaming, "So what do we do with him."

Draco glanced at Ron who was still lying frozen, Harry seemed to still be under a spell and was smiling and looking around.

"Both of them, I mean," Draco added.

"Banish the evil from his body, once we fix this one, the other one will get better," Sen explained and Draco suddenly wondered if she'd ever even met Harry and Ron.

"Do you know these two?" he asked.

"I've seen them around, never talked to them though," Sen said, "I actually just got to this school, this is my first year here. I'd been going to a local public school before."

"Ah," Draco said, "The one that is er, possessed, is Ron, and that's his friend Harry, Harry Potter."

"Seriously? The-Boy-Who-Lived?" Sen asked amazed and looked at Harry more closely, "I say, I see the scar now. I'd heard he went to Hogwarts, but didn't expect, well, I don't know what I expected. I'll have to get his autograph!"

"Um, yeah," Draco said feeling uncomfortable and wondering if Harry had to go through we people acting like this all the time.

"Back to work though," she said seeing Draco's expression. 

"Okay," Draco said still a little doubtful, "So how do we get the evil soul to leave?"

"First we have to shield our own minds," she said, "So the soul doesn't move to one of us once we make it leave Ron's body."

"How do we do that?" Draco asked.

"Well, you probably aren't very mentally strong right now," Sen said thoughtfully, "So I'll shield for you. You'll learn eventually, that's what I made this club for."

"Ah," Draco said and glanced at Harry who smiled then looked away.

"I'll do all the work," Sen assured him, "You just need to close your eyes and clear you mind, I'm going to draw on your strength to do the spell to get it to leave."

Draco wasn't sure he was okay with someone 'drawing on his strength' but he didn't have much of a choice. So he closed his eyes and tried to think of nothing, which he learned was something very hard to do.

After five minutes Sen spoke, "You're being too fidgety. Try to just hold one thing in your mind and think of nothing but it." 

"Okay," Draco said and closed his eyes again, this time choosing to think of a red square. He kept his mind fixating on that and only that. Gradually he felt something touch his mind then cover it, almost like a solid wall around it, that nothing could get through. Then he felt a small thread of energy go through the wall, leaving him. What felt like hours later he was jerked out of the trance to see Ron and Harry both looking normal again. 

He was about to stand up when he realized he was very tired. He blinked once then slowly stood up. A few black dots swam in front of his eyes, then they cleared and went away. 

"Your back to normal," he stated looking at Harry and Ron. Ron looked a little sick and Harry seemed rather disoriented, but they were both okay.

At that moment Professor Dumbledore burst in and looked around worried, after seeing that all four students were okay he gave a sigh of relief then sat down on a tree trunk.

"It seems you four dealt with everything just fine," he said then added, "You students never cease to amaze me."

"Ron was possessed," Sen told the professor, who turned to look at Ron.

"I can't remember anything after lunch," he admitted.

"I can remember, someone trying to strangle me, then blackness," Harry told Dumbledore.

"Do you know _who_ it was that possessed you Ron?" Dumbledore asked looking Ron in the eye.

Ron shook his head truthfully then said, "I don't know, but it was someone evil."

Professor Dumbledore then turned his gaze to Draco and said, "This is what you've been worrying about is it not? What happened to You-Know-Who and how he will strike again if he's alive."

Draco nodded surprised and curious to know how Dumbledore saw all this. "So it _was_ the Dark Lord that possessed Ron?" he asked.

"Indeed," Professor Dumbledore said, "And he will take over someone else, he's probably in their bodies already."

"What are we going to do about it?" Harry asked speaking up again.

"I think that Sen here can teach you a lot," Dumbledore said, "In the meanwhile I think I can hold it under control, you four could be a big help though."

Harry and Ron nodded, both of them getting that determined to help look on their faces, making Draco once again wonder and marvel at how, when just a moment ago they were both under the Dark Lord's influence, now they were very eager to go rushing after him. Draco would actually rather just learn to shield himself, then go and watch over Hermione, while the adults took care of everything.

"So, he _did_ die then?" Draco asked curiously.

"Yes, apparently he wasn't prepared for a collapse, they had so many protection and non-detection spells, we assume they grew un-watchful," Dumbledore explained, "Like before though, he has protected himself from fully leaving this world."

"Ah," Draco said simply.

"I'll be off then," Dumbledore said and left the classroom leaving the four students behind.

A/N: What fun.. don't you just love psychic stuff? Well, thank you soo much for reveiwing! This story might just live up to its prequel! A reminder.. Dungeon is the story that comes before this, I had some readers asking about that. 

Dedications to:

skitimo

duochang97

Tammy

Tori

dracohermioneluver

LiLbLueangeL1223

Marissa03

  
  



	7. Color Games

Friday Lunch 12: 16 pm

Draco sat on the grass down by the lake practicing the meditating exercises Sen had taught them after Professor Dumbledore had left. After thinking of that blue square for half an hour he tried the other technique and closed his eyes, this time listening and simply being aware of all that was around him. 

Sen said that almost all humans had souls, those that didn't were the kind of people that were in homes. Some animals and plants did too, except their souls were connected to the earth. The earth in its own way had its own soul, and the trees and grass's souls were tied to it. Animals were mixed, some had free souls, some had tied, and some, like bugs, didn't have them at all. She said souls were what gave you awareness, made you know that you were here, right now, that you were your own person, and you were no one else. 

Draco wasn't sure whether or not to believe any of it, but it made sense in a way, it fit with everything he'd learned before. He'd gotten up early that morning and skipped breakfast again, spending an hour with Hermione, she'd been asleep when he first got there, but then woken up and he'd talked to her, telling her about Ron and Sen and his worries about You-Know-Who. 

Draco's stomach growled reminding him of the lunch he'd brought with him to eat down by the lake. He found he really liked to just be outside and sit, it was much nicer and less confining. Being inside too much made him think about his time in the little cell, while being outside he could let his thoughts drift, as long as they didn't drift towards the Forbidden Forest. Amazing that they'd just dug some tunnels, Hogwarts was protected against all sorts of magical stuff, but it wasn't protected against people digging to it, unless they dug with magic. You-Know-Who had learned this and equipped his death eaters with a muggle tool called a shovel and set them to work. If Hogwarts had been protected against things like digging tunnels to or around it, many animals wouldn't have been able to live naturally and it would have disrupted things, so Draco didn't think it was stupid to not protect themselves that way. Then again, the animals could simply move to a different home. 

Draco unwrapped his sandwich and bit into savory the flavor of it, before his ordeal down there he'd never thought much about food, but after months of living off of stale bread and water, simple things like sandwiches tasted like the food of the angels. Every moment of your life was precious, and not one of those moments should be wasted was something Draco had learned, and he meant to do just that. 

Finished his lunch he stood up and headed back to the castle. The sky was clear and blue with only a few clouds hovering around the horizon. The sun beat down warmly, making Draco's black robes uncomfortably warm. The air itself though was still cool with that touch of ice in it. Spring was a wonderful season. 

Draco pushed open the door, that he used quite often, and stepped back inside the castle, shutting the door behind him. He was momentarily blinded while his eyes adjusted to the dimmer inside light. Once oriented he headed down the hallway to his afternoon classes.

Friday Evening 7:02 pm

In Sen's evening class they were taught the color game. It was a basic mental exercises where two people sent colors back and forth to each other. Later they'd move on to words. She explained that humans really only use about a third of their brains. It was believed that the other two thirds was where the soul was. It was in a way attached to you right there. One reason why all humans orient themselves at that point in their body, also their eyes were there, but even when the closed their eyes they see the whole world with the feeling of the body below them. As if you are your head and it is your body. Not you are your body. They soul though, floats freely around, only attached at that one point. Like a cloth with one corner nailed to a piece of wood. This drifting freely part was the part that could reach out and read things. Touch other souls and let information pass. Souls aren't nearly as solid as brains though, so obviously its much harder to psychically talk to someone than to use one's mouth. Souls aren't tied down time wise either, time is irrelevant to them.. they work on a whole different dimension, this explains looking into the future and looking into the past. There are many different ways to do this, but it all centers on using your soul to read the past and future. Soul-mates might even be those with the same soul, if time is irrelevant they could go back and forth in time, once you die, your soul may become your grandmother or grandfather. 

When Harry asked how can two souls be in one body at a time, when Ron was possessed, she had a answer ready. The Dark Lord's soul was not connected through the brain, it took over the body, controlling the body, this isn't normal though for soul's. Only if a person is able to bring enough memory and balance and preparation can this be possible. Obviously the Dark Lord was prepared for death, as he had been before. 

When class was over Sen packed up her things then waited by the door for Draco as the rest of the class, now about ten people, headed out. He put the rest of his things into his bag then walked to the door. 

"Hey Draco," she said with a slight smile.

"Hi," he said then added as they started walking down the hallway, "Class was pretty interesting today. I'm not sure what to make of it all though. I mean, its almost like another religion, can it all be true, or is it just another thing the human mind has made up as an explanation for the things we do not understand?"

"I thought that at first too, but so much of it makes so much sense, how can it not be true? Once your psychic strength starts developing you'll see what I mean," Sen told him, "Its almost scary how accurate you can get at the color game. When I first started it, I only got it right about 40% of the time, probably chance. But now, I get it right 99% of the time."

"You sounded a little bit like someone doing an ad there," Draco said with a slight chuckle, "Like where people tell how they had awful back pain, then they say once they started using this pain-away potion its all disappeared."

Sen laughed then said, "Or a missionary, out to convert you all to my new soul religion."

"Does there happen to be a god in these theories by any chance?" Draco asked grinning.

"Well, I believe all religions are true, each though are different ways of worshiping he who protects and watches over us. Whoever he is," Sen explained, "I think that it might be like the soul of the earth or something, in a way. Mother Earth you know?"

"A whole new definition for Mother Earth. Don't let these theories get popular or we'll have a whole new race of religious people on our hands," Draco said finding he actually really enjoyed being with Sen. He felt like he was really enjoying himself for once.

Sen laughed again then said, "There are lots of pychic stuff, whole libraries full of books about it, but a lot of it seems like real crap. Kind of cheesy healing and improve your life kind of things. Find your inner self."

"Well isn't this kind of like finding your inner self?" Draco asked.

"Not really, being able to look at yourself is a good thing, I encourage all to practice it, but its not in the category of souls," Sen explained, "Souls are what makes us different from animals, they make us aware of ourselves, but they aren't really you. Your brain and the way your were raised is what really makes you yourself. I really do think that souls have effect on your personality, but there's more to a person than your personality. I believe souls can carry some information, but not a lot, that's why some people can get hazy recalls of their own pasts. I'm sure I was a horse in one of my past lives."

Draco chuckled, "I don't think I can remember any past lives. So this is kind of like reincarnation then?"

"In a way," Sen said, "I think souls long for life, they go to this dimension but its kind of all, swirly you now? Chaotic or something. They reach out for life that doesn't have a soul and grab it and hang out. Mostly this would be babies, once born they can take on souls, and most animals too. Makes you wonder you know? Its like humans in high demand, hard to get a good human, lower choices would be animals, its like hm.. it seems like a tiger might be interesting..."

Draco laughed then glanced around trying to figure out where they were, he'd lost track of where they were going in his conversation with Sen.

"I need to stop at the Slytherin dormitory," Draco said realizing they were close to the lower parts of the castle.

"Sure," Sen said and they turned to head in that direction.

A/N: I've been kind of off and on with updating, been busy recently. And lazy, I don't think I did a author's note in chapter six.. unless I did.. Oh well. Hope you like the chapter! This one is actually kind of boring I thought, but don't worry more stuff will happen! Tell you friends to read this story! And Dungeon too.. Or Dungeon first actually, but then this one. Only four reviews this chapter... :-( 

This chapter is dedicated to:

Marrisa03

Earwen Colomanel

LiLbLueangeL1223

dracohermioneluver


	8. Flowers

Saturday Morning 8:38 am

Draco pushed off the ground bringing his firebolt high into the air. He circled around the goal posts of the Quidditch field a few times then flew higher. The field below him became smaller, as more of the horizon became viewable before his eyes. Hermione still wasn't any better. His worrying made him snappy and he gotten in a fight with Harry when trying to ask him something. 

The wind blew around him, stronger than normal being so much higher as he was. The sky was overcast threatening rain. He glanced up and felt a flurry of tiny droplets against his skin. Though the air was warm, the rain was cold and he flew down, deciding to head in. He landed smoothly, getting off his broom and heading back to the castle. The drops of rain became larger, but still light, as he reached the castle and stepped inside. He shook his blond hair, which was rather long by now, touching his shoulders and curling slightly at the bottom. Thinking about getting a hair cut he headed, first to the dormitory to put his broom back, then to Hermione's room. 

She was looking paler than usual and was asleep, she shivered slightly as he entered, even though there were several heavy blankets covering her. She lay on her side, her face looking at the right wall, one hand lying delicately on the pillow beside her face, the other tucked underneath. He said nothing as not to disturb but silently sent her a greeting and a _I love you and hope you get better soon_. He sat down in the usual chair by her bedside and took her hand holding it carefully in his own. It was warm to his touch and he kissed it softly before replacing it back on the pillow.

Saturday Noon 11:47 am

Draco's stomach grumbled loudly as he realized it was near lunch time and he'd been sitting in that chair for near 2 and a half hours. He stood up, his joints protesting, and stretched once, then looked back down at Hermione. She'd woken up briefly and he'd been able to speak to her, but it was like speaking to no one. She wasn't quite there and it scared him. He murmured his love then left the room. The next time they went to Hogsmeade, he'd get her something, flowers maybe. The room was so drab, plain white walls, white sheets, white pillows, blankets and chairs. It needed color.

Down by the lake Draco sat down in his usual spot, carrying his lunch in a paper bag. The giant squid was near the shore making occasional ripples on the otherwise glassy lake. He felt a slight movement behind him, then someone sat down on the grass next to him. The rain had stopped, though the grass was still damp. There were a few patches in the sky where blue longed to get through.

He turned to see Harry sitting next to him. He looked in almost as bad condition as Draco, probably worrying over Hermione as well.

"What if she dies?" Harry asked softly. Draco wondered why Harry was asking Draco this, they weren't enemies any longer, but they definitely weren't friends yet.

"She won't," Draco said, but Harry's statement had brought up those thoughts he'd tried to shove away. She wouldn't die, couldn't, not after finally escaping from their dungeon.

"How do you know?" Harry asked, sounding to Draco like a little boy asking why? why? Why? Over and over again.

"I don't!" he snapped standing up and heading back to the castle. He bit his lip letting the short outburst of anger drift away. Harry could be arrogant and selfish at times, but he hadn't been either of them when Draco had snapped at him. Worry was doing that to him though.

A group was going to Hogsmeade that day and Draco decided to go with them to get some flowers for Hermione's room. The sky was cloudy and threatened to rain again, but Draco decided a little bit of wetness would be refreshing. The head of gryfindor, Professor Bitchwomanfromhell, was leading the group. She gave them all a fierce look as though she expected them all to be buying illegal drugs in dark alleyway and getting drunk. He stared back and her eyes passed over him until she turned and led the way. You'd think that they were old enough to go to Hogsmeade by them selves by now. 

After the long walk the wizard village came into view. Draco got a strange feeling, not being able to remember the last time he'd been year. Before he'd been in the Dungeons of You-Know-Who. That seemed like eons ago. He separated himself from the rest of the group then started walking down a street looking for a flower shop. He hoped it wasn't too early in spring to be selling flowers. Of course, they could probably grow them any time of the year using magic and stuff. Up ahead he spotted a sign with a large flower on it. Hoping it was a flower shop he walked up to it to see that it was a hair shop. __

_ What kind of freakin' hair shop has a flower for a logo?_ Draco thought with a slight sneer and a glance up at the sky. The clouds hung low and heavy. He almost wished it would rain, clear his head, rid it of too many thoughts.

Finally a flower shop, that had a girl's face for a logo, appeared and Draco stepped inside, breathing in the fresh fragrance of many different types of flowers. He walked through the many rows, feeling uncomfortably warm in the greenhouse like shop. Finally he chose a bunch of pale blue flowers and paid the girl in the back of shop before going outside holding the flowers. He felt a little silly carrying around with a bunch of flowers but he ignored the feeling and started to head back to Hogwarts, wanting to get the flowers into water quickly. 

A/N: Hopefully I'll start putting up chapters quicker. Be good with getting them up. All the soul stuff is just some theories that I like to ponder. The color game is real though. Anyway, thanks for reviewing to everyone who did! So many reviews this chapter!

Dedications:

dracohermioneluver

LiLbLueangeL1223

hedwigmail

SkittlesStar25

Ashely Nikole Malfoy

Cereza

Marrisa03

duochang97


	9. Screams In My Head

Monday Morning 5:35 am 

Draco woke up feeling sick and hurried out of bed to the bathroom where he vomited into the toilet. The sounds of screams and moans of agony echoed in his ears. Sighing, he realized that he still had yet to get over his time down there. Shivering he shut his eyes only to be reminded of the awful chilling dark. He stood up slowly flushing the toilet then going over to the sink and splashing some water on his face. He peered at his reflection in the mirror. His eyes looked worried and his mouth was drawn. Maybe he needed counseling or something to help get over what he and Hermione had gone through. Or maybe, he needed Hermione to get better. Hermione's room was considerably more cheery looking with the flowers. The thought of Hermione made his heart tug and he pushed away from the sink going back to his bed and flopping down onto it, burying his face in the pillows. 

An hour later he heard the rest of the boys in the dormitory getting up and when Goyle poked him hesitantly he told them he was sick and wasn't going to classes that day. Crabbe and Goyle didn't seem to quite know what do without Draco and still followed him around, just not as body-guard like anymore. 

Monday Afternoon 4:01 pm

Harry pet Crookshanks absentmindedly, running his hands through the cat's soft fur. Crookshanks purred and Harry wondered what the cat was thinking. Did he wonder where his owner had gone, what she was doing? His mind trailed to think no, but then decided it was probably yes. Crookshanks had seemed uneasy and troubled the first month of Hermione's disappearance before settling down a little bit. Now though he was insistent and curious as though he knew she was back in the building but knew he couldn't get to her. Harry wondered if they'd let him bring Crookshanks to the Infirmary, he could always sneak him in. Anything, to help Hermione get better. 

At that moment Ginny climbed through the portrait hole into the common room, the sun shining brilliantly on her red hair making it look like fire.

"Hey Ginny," he said with a smile and started to stand letting Crookshanks jump off his lap before fully standing. The cat gave him a reproachful look, disliking not being the center of attention.

"Hi Harry," she said with a grin, "I was just visiting Hermione, I think she's getting better, someone put flowers in the room, was that you? I was able to talk to her a bit, but she stilled seemed a little, not there."

"No," Harry said, "I mean I didn't put the flowers in her room, probably a good idea though. I was thinking of bringing Crookshanks there, maybe help her get better."

"She _will_ get better," Ginny said, and she sounded like she truly believed it too, "That doesn't mean we can't do all we can though to help."

Harry felt his spirits lifting as Ginny talked, it was nice to be in the presence of a friend, being alone always made his thoughts go towards the 'half-empty' ones. 

"Want to go for a walk? Get outside?" Harry asked glancing at the window, the sun was just low enough to be shining in the windows, but still a few hours from sunset.

"Sure," Ginny replied and slung her bag down carelessly, not worrying about someone taking it, Ginny had that kind of care-free, full of life, and mischievous nature, that always made Harry feel happier no matter what was going on. Harry climbed through the hole first then waited for Ginny before walking down the hallway next to her, down the stairs, and onto the Hogwarts grounds.

As Harry and Ginny headed back to the castle he noticed her being oddly silent, he glanced over at her, but she was staring off into the distance. Once back inside the castle he tapped her slightly.

"Ginny?" he asked, then added, "Thinking about something?"

When Ginny said nothing in response Harry got a cold feeling in the pit of his stomach. Curious and confused he stepped around to look at her face only to see her eyes startlingly black and empty. His own eyes widened and he took a step back. 

Then she spoke in a voice not her own, "Potter. You won't escape this time. You cannot hurt me, I will always be watching you."

Harry felt panic wash over him, realizing that the same thing had happened to Ginny that had happened to Ron, only this time Voldemort wasn't casting a spell over him. What if he did? Hurried, Harry pulled out his wand then nearly dropped it when Ginny/Voldemort spoke again.

"Silly boy," Ginny/Voldemort said, "You can hinder me, but you won't dare harm your precious friend."

"Shut-up!" Harry said trying to block him out then he mumbled the words for the full body lock. Light shot out of his wand and struck G/V in the chest. He felt his heart leap up seeing Ginny falling back, a surprised look on her face, despite the black eyes. He darted forward and caught her before she hit the floor, then nearly did drop her when he looked into her eyes. The black pits glared up at him, then suddenly, her eyes closed. Feeling panicky he undid the spell, briefly wondering if that was safe to do. Praying Voldemort had left her body he waited as she opened her eyes to reveal her normal soft brown eyes. 

He felt a smile break out and he reached out to put a hand on her shoulder before speaking, "Are you okay?"

"Yes," she replied looking confused, sitting up she asked, "What happened?"

"Voldemort," Harry replied his face turning grim, "He possessed you, remember how Ron and I told you about when Ron was possessed?"

Ginny's eyes widened, her face a mask of surprise, "He possessed me?"

Harry nodded biting his lip, wondering how they'd ever get Voldemort this time. Now he had a advantage, Harry would never harm his friends, or any student or teacher of Hogwarts. The best they could do was contain him, and Harry didn't even know if that would work, if he could force his way through magics cast upon a body he controlled. 

Ginny shivered and Harry helped her to her feet before giving her a quick hug, then stepping back to look at her. He felt a soft rush of caring and something more wash over him.

"We should take you to the Hospital Wing and make sure you're okay," Harry said taking her hand. She nodded her face set grim.

"I feel like I just blacked out or something," Ginny said, "Like this cold wind blowing at you, then nothing."

Harry nodded, "I know exactly what you mean. After Madame Pomfrey declares you healthy, we should also report this to Dumbledore. We need to be on the watch for whoever he'll go to now."

A/N: 50 reviews!! Woo hoo! That's half of a hundred! 

Dedications:

SkittlesStar25

Ashley Nikole Malfoy

Cereza

LiLbLueangeL1223

dracohermioneluver

Marrisa03

  



	10. Only Hermione

A/N: Here's a pic of some person who looks like how I imagined Sen, so if you want an idea, just make this person's hair short and black. Sen

Monday Evening6: 49 pm

Draco sat curled up in the chair by Hermione's bed watching her carefully. He'd brought more flowers in a desperate attempt to make the room look more than just 'cheery'. Crookshanks was sleeping on her bed, no doubt Potter had done that. Since he'd snapped at him down by the lake Draco hadn't seen much of him. Despite all his thinking he'd done down in that cell, he found it hard to actually put those thoughts into actions. His old habits coming back to him very naturally. He knew though, that he had changed. Thinking back on how he was before, then about how he acted now, he knew that no matter what, he'd always be different. And he liked himself better this way. He'd never been satisfied with who he'd been before, but now he felt full and complete. Part of that was Hermione as well, she filled that hole that he'd been missing his whole life. He'd never really known love, not from his father or his mother. Both of them were now dead, and he didn't really care. The manor was his now, if it hadn't been destroyed as well. If not, the elves would take care of it until he was old enough to live there. A sudden thought struck him though, would he be allowed to stay there alone all summer?

Luckily he hadn't encountered Harry and Ron in this room again, he got the feeling they disliked him being in there, and disliked the idea of him being friends with Hermione. What would they think they knew he'd kissed her, and she'd kissed him back. He felt of flood of love remembering her when they were down there, always glowing, a fierce determination in her eyes, the way she pursed her lips when she was thinking hard, and the feel of her in his arms. 

His stomach growled and he sent fierce curses at it, and it rumbled more insistently. Scowling he stood up, giving Hermione's a soft kiss on the forehead, wishing she would recover, before heading down to the great hall. The tables were set with plates and people sat scattered about, a lot having already eaten, and some waiting til later hours. He sat down at the Slytherin table and starting filling his plate with a grilled cheese sandwich, green beans, and salad. Too bad the house elves never made fatty horribly unhealthy food. He could do with some right now. He wished he could feel happy, but with Hermione is such a ill state, he found he was constantly feeling grumpy. 

Draco felt rather than saw someone slide into the seat next to him then heard Sen spoke, "What have you been up to? Haven't seen you all day."

"Wasn't feeling good," he answered simply still not turning to look at her yet, but feeling grateful for her presence.

"Ah," Sen said and seemed to decide to change the subject, "Are you coming to classes tonight?"

Draco shrugged but said, "Yeah, its something to look forward to."

Sen smiled, "Great."

Draco said nothing and instead busied himself with his food. Then he felt her place a hand on his shoulder.

"Hey Draco, it'll be alright, I can kind of understand what you're going through, I don't know what exactly happened to you down there, but we all know what Voldemort was, is, like," she said, and Draco felt he should give her some credit for knowing exactly what was bothering him. What she didn't know was that half of it was his love for Hermione.

"I'll be fine," Draco said feeling a little uncomfortable at Sen trying to comfort him, he shrugged the feeling off then, finished his food, stood up. Then, glancing at the clock, added, "We should be going to you class then."

"Okay," Sen said brightly and they walked out of the great hall. He felt his mood lightening as they walked down the hallway; hoping the class would be interesting as it had been for before.

7:10 am

Draco sat outside in one of the gardens near the greenhouses with Sen. It was after class, and they'd gone outside to do some more practices. Harry and Ron had been at class as usual and well as a few other people curious to see what this was about. 

He closed his eyes and concentrated on centering himself, then he reached out and touched the spirits of those close. He felt himself recognize Sen's, what she told was him called aura. 

"I'll send you a color," he heard her say and he prepared himself by opening his mind, clearing it of all stray thoughts. A swirl of colors blazed into his mind and he tried to not focus on any in particular.

"Blue," he said finally opening his eyes.

Sen shook her head, her short black hair seeming even darker in the moonlight, "Close though, it was orange."

"Orange?" Draco asked and she smiled, strangely Draco felt his heart beat a little faster as he watched her.

"Opposite of blue, very close," she explained, "Maybe if we try holding hands it'll work better."

Draco felt uncomfortable, with her and his own feelings, as she scooted closer, right up next to him and took his hand. 

"Now lets try again," Sen said and Draco closed his eyes as she spoke again, "This time, you send."

Draco concentrated on the color green and let his mind focus on it completely before opening up and feeling for her aura, then he imagined his thoughts, the color green, flow towards her touching her brain and spirit.

"Green," she said after a moment. Draco grinned, almost stupidly as he opened his eyes to look at her. She turned her head looking up at him then leaned closer and kissed him lightly, then more deeply when he didn't pull away. 

Fire scorched throughout his body and his heartbeat quickly sped to what felt like a million beats a minute. He brought his arms around her as passion burned through him. He was painfully aware of every place their bodies touched, their hands, lips, legs... he leaned closer, then stopped, pulling away. 

"No," he said softly turning his head.

"What?" Sen asked touching his shoulder softly.

"I can't, I mean," Draco bit his lip and stood up his own emotions and feelings a chaotic storm, "I need to think."

He stood up abruptly and turned to walk back towards the castle feeling like he was betraying his love for Hermione, betraying her and himself. Did he love Sen? Draco didn't know, he wanted, part of him wanted very badly to feel skin against skin, to feel that passion, wanted more than just kissing. He felt revolted almost by his feelings, like his own self was betraying him. He didn't want Sen though, she was beautiful yes, but he didn't love her. The feelings she ignited in him, was only lust. He sighed trying to accept this. He _loved_ Hermione and love was far more important and lust. He didn't love Sen, only liked her as a friend. Which wasn't a good reason to kiss someone, he could live without her, but he couldn't live without Hermione. 

A/N: Woo hoo! Sixty reviews! Dedicating this chapter to:

Dreammergurl2007

ChastityMorrows

Marissa03

LiLbLueangeL1223

dracohermioneluver


	11. I'm Here

**Monday Night 8:30 pm**

Draco sat watching Hermione, wishing that she would just wake up. It was starting to seem hopeless, he felt like he'd never be happy again, and knew that if she died, he wouldn't be able to live. He felt like he had to be doing something, wished there was some way he could help her. When she was awake, it only made him more afraid for her, he talked to her and tried to convince her that it would be alright, and they were safe from Voldemort, but somehow she didn't seem like she could believe that. She'd been so strong when they were down there, he didn't see how this could just happen to her. They'd gone through the same things, why didn't this happen to him?

He'd pulled the chair right up next to her bed and sat holding her hand. He brushed a few strands of hair out of her face and wished there was a window in this room to let in sunlight and bring some color to her pale face. Maybe he could ask about getting her moved to a new room. He gazed at her face, wishing she'd open her eyes and look at him and he'd know she was better, he'd never been so desperate for something in his life.

Suddenly there was a knock at the door, then it opened and Sen stepped in. He glanced up surprised and waited for her to speak.

Sen's eyes studied him a moment then her gaze moved to Hermione and back to him. She still said nothing and took notice of the fact Draco was holding Hermione's hand. She narrowed her eyes a moment then looked back at Draco.

"You love her," she stated.

Draco raised his eyebrows and wondered if it was that obvious, and felt a little worry at not having told anyone. Sen would surely tell Harry and Ron, then it would get out over the whole school, and he wasn't sure wether their reaction would be good or bad.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Sen asked curiously pulling over the other chair and sitting down as well.

"Before we'd been captured," Draco began, "We were enemies, I'm a slytherin and she's a gryfindor. I was a arrogant son of a bitch and she was a brainy, bushy haired girl with large teeth. It was in my blood to hate mud- half borns and gryfindors. She's both. Harry and Ron still hate me, and I don't think have quite forgiven me for all my bullying."

"Yet now, this is all different," Sen said knowing exactly where he was going, "You changed and saw her as different?"

Draco nodded, amazed at Sen's ability to see right to the point.

"I'm sorry," she said then, "For kissing you I mean, I didn't know, I see now, I mean"- she stopped and smiled slightly realizing she was started to babble. "Maybe we can just forget that ever happened?"

"Sure," Draco said glad that he'd be able to put that behind him. He also found that he didn't feel anything beyond friendship for Sen, he'd been worried that when he saw her again the feelings he'd felt when kissing her would arise. Then he asked, "You won't tell anyone, will you? I don't think, it would cause a war between the gryfindors and slytherins, not that there isn't already one, but it would make a lot of people call both of us traitors."

**9:10**

Draco sat staring out the window thoughtfully and took a moment to look back at what had happened since being back. It'd really only been one or two weeks, yet it felt like ages, years, since he'd been down in the dungeons. He gave a shiver and tried to push those memories away, instead deciding to think about, something else.

He realized that as well as his views, his personality had changed more than he'd realized. He was almost, mellow, not nearly as closed up and snappy. When Sen asked him something, he simply answered. Maybe in talking to Hermione he'd become accustomed to basically speaking his mind. He could of denied loving Hermione, yet, Sen would have seen through him. Lying, that was a large change, lies had used to come easily, his whole being was made up of lies. Now though, he couldn't remember the last time he'd lied. The truth was so much better out in the open and not covered up where it could see the world. He bit his lip thoughtfully then got into his bed hoping to fall asleep before th other Slytherins came in. They tended to be a little loud, and made it hard to get to sleep, though once he was asleep, not much woke him up. He found he slept fairly deeply, rather than lightly, since he'd gotten back. Down in their cell, he'd woken at the slightest thing. Now, he found his sleep uninterrupted, one of the tiny things you tend to take for granted.

**12:03**

Sitting up with a start Draco pulled open the curtains around his bed. He glanced around the room, wondering what had make him wake so suddenly. He felt wide awake, not at all tired. The moonlight shown through the window brightly and Draco knew it would be more than an hour before he got back to sleep. He climbed out of bed and slipped his robe on over his pajamas, then pulled on his shoes.

His footsteps made no noise on the carpeted floor of the dormitory, he pushed open the door carefully and stole up to the common room then out into the hallways. He shivered, disliking the damp feel of the stone hallways in the lower parts of the castle. It reminded him too much of You-Know-Who's dungeons. He quickly climbed up into the warmer parts of the castle and found himself heading towards the hospital wing, though he'd known all along he'd go there, he'd never actually thought it. He pushed open the door and sat down in the chair that was now quite familiar to him and pulled it closer, then on a second thought sat down on the bed and lay down next to her. She stirred slightly then opened her eyes.

"Draco?" she asked, and there was something in her voice that made Draco's heart jump wildly.

"I'm here," he said softly feeling his voice catch in his throat. He took her hand and gave it a slight squeeze to reassure her.

**A/N: Heh, cliff hanger.. Thanks to all you guys for reveiwing! Reviews are what keep us authors going! I got such good reviews too!!!**

**Dedications to:**

**Snowbear**

**TickleMeHellmo**

**SkittlesStar25**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Lady Jade Green**

**Marissa03**

**lelimo**

**duochang97**

**dracohermioneluver**


	12. The Truth

**Tuesday Morning 12:10 am**

"I want to get better," Hermione said softly, her voice barely above a whisper, "I don't want to be here stuck in this room, I need to get better, everything was so hazy, I almost believed I was still in the dungeons for a bit there."

Draco stayed silent almost not believing what he was hearing. Had she finally pulled out of it, was she going to get better?

"You're here now though," Draco said putting a arm around her and pulling her closer, "I won't let you go."

She turned her head and smiled at him, and he saw that she truly was back. He felt an overwhelming happiness surge throughout him and kiss her forehead softly feeling a single tear run down his cheek.

"What time is it?" she asked startling Draco. Then he laughed and told her it was around midnight, about two weeks since they'd got back.

"Where am I?" she asked looking around the room with a studious expression on her face.

"Now you ask that," Draco teased, feeling delighted that she was suddenly better, back to herself, of course not even he was truly better, but she was over Shock or whatever it was that had affected her so.

"Infirmary?" she asked curiously raising a eyebrow.

"Your own special room," he told her, brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes.

"Can we get out of here?" she asked pulling herself up into a sitting position. She gave a little groan then winced, "I feel so weak. Soft."

"I don't think broth is very nourishing," Draco said easing himself up into a sitting position.

"Is that what they've been feeding me?" she asked.

Draco nodded and gave a grin, realizing he almost forgotten what it had been like to be happy. He glanced at his watch, "You want to get out of here now?"

"Why? What's wrong with now?" she asked curiously, reaching up to rub some sleep out of her eyes then said, "Ah, I want to shower, I feel like I slept too long."

"It's kind of late," Draco told her, "You chose to come out of it right at midnight."

"What are you doing here then?" Hermione asked curiously.

"You sound like you don't want me here," Draco said then told her, "I couldn't sleep."

"I did a lot of thinking, I felt like, in a way I was trapped inside myself, and it was all emotions, and then there was you," she said softly and looked up at him.

"I"-

"Please kiss me," she said interrupting him, that light that burned in her during the time he'd known her in the dungeons coming back into her eyes. Draco nodded and leaned down touching his lips to hers, feeling himself drowning in the sweetness of her kiss.

It was altogether a different experience from kissing Sen. Passion mixed with the unfaltering love he had for her and the unending caring, made it very different, and much better. Pure passion without love, made him feel, almost dirty, passion was nice, but by it self... it didn't feel right. This, what he had with Hermione felt right. He felt like he would start floating and his heart would burst he loved her so much, she made him so happy.

"Draco?" Hermione asked pulling away, her voice turning serious, and with a tinge of fear in it.

"I'm here," he told her worried, feeling the sudden change, as she tensed up.

"I need to tell you something," she said, "I think I was in denial for a bit there, but where ever I was it cleared my mind, and, in order to get over this, I need to tell you."

"Okay," Draco said unsure, wondering, what it was she needed to tell him. He scooted closer to her, and took her hand to reassure her.

"Down in the dungeons, when they took me," Hermione began, and bit her lip. Draco saw how it was very hard for her to say this, "they tortured me, but it was more than just curses and spells, Draco. They, I mean I was, I was raped."

Draco took in a breath and without a thought sat down on the bed next to her and took her in his arms as she started sobbing.

"It'll be okay, things will be okay," he said softly rocking her back and forth, until finally she fell asleep, Draco assumed he must have to at some point, for it was 6:42 when he woke up.

**6:42 am**

Draco opened his eyes feeling rather stiff and cramped, he was about to sit up when he felt the weight of Hermione curled up against him. He yawned and stretched his arms then turned his gaze down on Hermione, her face peaceful. Her eyes flickered open, then closed, then opened again and she turned her head to look up at him, smiling slightly.

"Morning, love," he said feeling himself smile back then asked, "How do you feel?"

"Better," she replied and took a breath with a slight shiver, "I guess I got it out then."

"You're not pregnant are you?" he asked worry evident in his voice.

Hermione shook her head, then blushed slightly, "There's spells and stuff, my parents made sure I knew them. Kind of embarrassing."

She shivered again and Draco knew it wasn't from cold, then she added on, "I kind of put it down in the little dark corner in the back of my brain, then I started falling in love with you, and that made me shove it even farther back, but I guess that just made it worse. Better to confront and work through it, instead of ignoring it."

"You want to talk about it more then?" he asked brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. She shrugged then said, "I felt, violated."

Draco nodded, "They took something from you, that they had no right to."

"I'm glad they're all dead," Hermione said, vehemence filling her voice.

"They got only what they deserved," Draco said and Hermione slowly nodded.

"There's a lot you need to be caught up on," Draco said and smiled softly, Hermione opened her mouth to say something else when the doorknob turned. Draco looked at his watch, it was 7:00, it was probably Potter coming to stop in before breakfast.

"Shit, act natural," he said and quickly got off the bed and into the chair as the door opened to reveal none other than Harry Potter.

He glanced around the room taking in Draco's rumpled clothing, assuming he'd slept in the chair, and then the fact that Hermione was sitting up and awake, and looking, alive again.

"Hermione!" he yelled and ran forward to hug her, knowing right away that she was better, or at least on the road towards it. Draco stood slowly up and paused in the doorway, Hermione was grinning, engaged in talking to Harry. He caught her eyes and mouthed, "I love you. I'll come in a hour."

**A/N: Thanks for reviewing! 77 reviews! That's like 7 reviews a chapter! There's probably gonna be another 10 chapters or so after this one, not even near the end yet. Dedications To:**

Dreammergurl2007

SkittlesStar25

LiLbLueangeL1223

duochang97

dracohermioneluver

Marissa03


	13. Road To Recovery

**Wednesday 7:05 pm**

Harry was thrilled, Hermione was on the road to recovery. He still didn't quite understand what had happened to her, and what had pulled her out of it, but he didn't really care. Now they could start getting on in life.

He was walking off the quidditch field, his broom over his shoulder, quidditch practice had just finished. He started heading for the castle when he heard a yell. He glanced up at the stands to see Ginny, she stood up on the seats and jogged down them, jumping off the bottom on.

"Hey Harry," she said tucking a astronomy book into her bag, "I was just doing some studying outside, such a nice day today."

"Oh? And I thought you were there to admire me playing quidditch with supreme skill," Harry said.

Ginny laughed and shoved him, "Don't be so vain."

"Okay, okay," Harry said glancing up at the clear blue sky and changing the subject, "You been to see Hermione yet?"

Ginny grinned, "Yep, we talked for a couple hours."

Harry felt a smile spread across his face, Ginny's bounciness being contagious. She was wearing her hair back in a ponytail, but a few strands had come loose in the breeze, and she tucked them behind her ears.

"The doctors are gonna let her walk around tomorrow," Harry said.

"Really? That's great!" Ginny said happily, "I think she's dying to get out of that bed. I think she already walked around some early this morning, when we were all asleep, since they wouldn't let her yesterday."

Harry laughed, "Sounds like something she'd do."

"Want to go eat dinner?" Ginny asked, "I'm starved. Missed lunch today."

"What time is it?" Harry asked with a grin once again glancing up the sky, this time though, his gaze turned towards the sun.

"Ah, around 7 I think," Ginny answered vaguely, "Dinner time either way."

"The days are getting longer," he said then added, "Feels like its only 5 or 6."

"Did you just hear that?" Ginny asked in a startled voice. Harry turned around to see a hufflepuff on a broom flying straight towards them. A few other hufflepuffs were shouting to her to no avail. Her eyes had a cold dead look.

"Ah," Harry recognized that look from when Ron had been possessed.

Ginny's eyes widened while Harry thought frantically to remember what Sen had told them to do. He hoped he wasn't going to have to live the rest of the year being chased by possessed people.

Harry heard Ginny yell the spell for a full body bind and silently thanked her for her fast thinking and Ron for convincing her to come to Sen's classes as well.

The hufflepuff fell of her broom landing on the ground with a thud. Harry walked carefully over as the broom drifted obediently to the ground. He shivered seeing the cold hatred in the eyes of the frozen student.

"Let's get a teacher," Ginny said biting her lip. Harry nodded wishing Voldemort had never existed. Why him? Sighing he kicked a stone, taking his anger out on it. Ginny started running to the castle while Harry sat down near the hufflepuff. The other hufflepuffs had by now landed and were running over curiously.

Harry explained that their friend was possessed and would be alright. Dumbledore had informed he school of the trouble they were encountering, but so far, Harry was sure he, Ron, and Draco had been the only ones to actually experience it. He was also sure Voldemort had possessed someone before this person. The only question was who it had been and what had been done. Would he ever be free from Voldemort? He wished he wouldn't have to kill him, he didn't want to kill anyone, he just wanted to be normal, live like any other student at Hogwarts, with friends, a family, a home.

Finally Professor Dumbledore, Snape, and McGonagall came running out of the school. McGonagall's mouth was thin as she assessed the situation. Frowning she floated the student up and together she and Dumbledore heading back to the castle.

Snape stared nastily at them then told them to report back to their dormitories immediately. Harry glared back but didn't say anything. Ginny who'd been behind the teachers, slipped past Snape to come over to Harry's side, taking his hand, as they walked towards their common room.

**Wednesday 6:50**

Draco decided he wanted to spend as much time as possible with Hermione, as long as she wasn't in classes, he didn't really need to be that much either. He'd already decided to either take summer school or extra half year to year of school at Hogwarts.

He hadn't seen much as Sen recently, and wasn't sure he wanted to that much. He was still a little uncomfortable about when she'd kissed him, but he was sure she was cool about it, and that they could be friends. Hermione would have to meet Sen soon too.

The sun was still shining brightly in the sky when he pushed open the door to her room. She was buried in a book, jotting down notes on paper on the bedside table. She gotten dressed in her old robes and had pulled her hair back into a bun. She was beautiful as always. Her eyes were so intense, concentrated on the work before her. She'd be a successful person in life one day.

"Good evening my love," he said courteously then when Hermione looked up he grinned and pulled a chair up.

"Homework already?" he asked. Hermione smiled and shrugged. "I have to keep up my studies, you've already had a week or so of school, I need to start catching up a soon as possible."

"I'm thinking of taking another year," Draco said then added, "I'm too lazy to spend free time doing extra work. If I were still in bed I'd be lazing around doing nothing."

Hermione laughed, music to his ears, then said, "I can see you doing just that."

"Care to go outside before it gets dark?" he asked.

"I'm not really supposed to until tomorrow," Hermione said but he saw in her eyes that she had already said yes.

"That stops you?" he asked remembering the short walk they'd went on that morning. Hermione grinned and set her books down. He took her hand as she climbed out of bed and for a moment she stood still, catching her balance.

"Haven't walked in so long," she said, "Not including this morning."

Draco nodded, "It takes a bit to build up those muscles you took for granted."

Draco led her out the door, glancing up and down the corridor to see if anyone was coming. Then held back a shiver of fear when it reminded him too much of looking up and down the dungeon tunnels for death eaters.

"Coast is clear," he said softly, "Not sure what the sight of us walking around together would stir up. Not many people even realize I visit you, except for Harry, Ron, and Sen of course."

"Sen?" Hermione asked curiously. The way Draco said her name she knew she was someone that by now they were used to having around. A teacher perhaps, or more probably a new student?

Draco flushed, along with a noticeable change in his demeanor. "Ah, she's a new student."

Hermione wondered slightly at the sudden uncomfortableness and gave him a look. Draco looked away for a moment then bit his lip as the started walking down the hallway.

"She's been teaching us about psychic stuff, since You-Know-Who has been possessing people, she taught Harry, Ginny, Ron, and I about blocking it and all that," he started to explain.

"Possessing people?" Hermione asked realizing that a lot could happen in only two weeks. That she had missed a lot.

Draco grinned thinking the same thoughts as she, "You have a lot to catch up on, not just school work."

Hermione felt herself smiling also and nodded looking up at Draco. She narrowed her eyes slightly, thoughtfully, as she studied his face, it was much healthier, full of color. The expression on his face had changed as well. When they'd first met it had been hard, but his prolonged stay had made him much more passive. His face showed all that.

Draco suddenly felt his heart soar, as he knew that Hermione was getting better, would live,

would be there with him. He felt her gaze studying him and he caught her eye then leaned over and kissed her softly on the lips, forgetting about the rest of the world. Not caring if anyone walked down the hallways to see them.

He wrapped his arms around her pulling her close, not ever wanting to let go of her again. She kissed him back fervently as though it would be the last kiss they ever had, bring her own arms around his neck in turn. Draco felt like he could drown in the sweetness of her kiss.

Finally they broke apart, luckily not catching the attention of anyone in perpendicular hallways. He grinned at her. Hermione smiled, lighting up her whole face, then she laughed and hugged him. He laughed as well, feeling rather giddy, as he hugged her back fiercely.

**A/N: I can't believe people like this story so much! You guys don't know how much your reviews mean to me, seriously, reviews keep us authors going. I've actually some chapters ahead, heh, but I don't want to put them all up, so you'll have to wait!**

**Dedications To:**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**duochang97**

**dreammergurl2007**

**Snowbear**

**marrisa03**

**dracohermioneluver**

**SkittlesStar25**

**ChastityMorrows**


	14. Time With Draco

**Wednesday 7:30 PM**

It was late enough in the evening the most of the students were eating dinner, and who would recognize the backs of a boy and a girl sitting down by the lake in the bad light? Together Draco and Hermione sat, arms around each other, gazing out at the lake, happy just to be in each other's presence.

"I should tell you about Sen," he said. Hermione shifted slightly but said nothing.

"My conscious is really killing me, I want you to know," Draco told her first. He moved his arm and scooted around so he was facing her instead of the lake. She glanced away from the lake to watch his face. She knew he'd been not saying something about Sen, and wasn't sure what it was, but knew no matter what, she still loved him.

"I never was attracted to Sen," he started explaining, "But she had a crush on me apparently. So, I guess I was giving the wrong signals or something, I really like her as a friend, she's a great person, you'll really like her, but getting to the point, she- we kissed. I thought you should know. She's the only person who knows that other than me. I love _you_ though, don't forget that, please."

Hermione knew Draco expected anger, or simply cool mistrust, but instead Hermione smiled slightly, a tear trickling down her cheek and she leaned over pulling him close and whispered, "I love you too. I could never have a more truthful, trusting, respectful, loving- boyfriend," Hermione suddenly laughed softly then continued, "Boyfriend sounds weird, after all we went through, it sounds you're some guy I met at a dance."

Draco grinned and kissed her forehead softly, then the tip of her nose moving down to her mouth, pressing his lips against hers softly.

When they came apart he found himself breathless, his heart beating quickly. He found the smile, that was becoming familiar, come to his face as he stared into Hermione's eyes. Her face showed amusement, laughter, happiness, but behind them fear and hurt, telling him despite her outside appearance she wasn't over what had happened to her, and neither was he.

Draco scooted closer and wrapped his arms around her pulling her close in a comforting hug before whispering, "It'll be alright, we'll get through this together."

He heard a slight splash of the kids who were still swimming in the darkness, something that reassured him that they weren't all alone outside in the evening. He glanced at the forest feeling a chill of fear, the same feeling of being exposed creeping up on him. Draco saw Hermione glance over to the kids swimming on the dock then looked back at Draco, then her gaze too shifted towards the forest.

"They're all dead," he said, reading her thoughts, "There's no reason why anyone other than You-Know-Who would be after us."

"You said he was possessing people?" she asked and he nodded. "So he's loose in the school in the form of a soul?"

Again Draco nodded then added, "Possessed Ron once, first too I think. Though he's more after Harry then either of us." He paused then added, "I'm not sure that's a good thing though."

Hermione smiled softly then said, "Been talking to Harry at all? You used to be enemies. _We_ used to be enemies."

Draco grinned then said, "A little, we have, differences. I hope no one over there realizes who we are."

"Would it be so bad if they did?" she asked.

"We'd start civil wars," he said.

Hermione frowned suddenly then said, "I really am starting to hate the whole house thing. I think teams are alright, but sorted by personality... it creates hatred over differences early in our lives."

Draco nodded, "I agree, but try telling that to the whole school. Since the hatreds have already formed, the older grades won't want to mix as much, which just confirms what you said. If anyone could find a way though, it'd be you, to get rid of the houses."

"With your help of course," she said smiling. Draco smiled back then started to stand up.

"Oh, and Sen knows about us, me and you. I'm not sure how she figured it out, she just kind of came into your room and I was watching you and she just blurted it out kind of," Draco explained.

"We should get back to the castle," Hermione told him and Draco gave her a hand. She took it and he pulled her up into his arms giving her a quick kiss before they started back for the castle.

**Thursday 7:30 AM**

Harry spent breakfast continuing to update Hermione on the going on's at the school. She wanted to know even the tiniest details, like how many games they'd won, and who was getting what kind of grades. He was happy to not have to worry about her getting better, ecstatic that she was.

Hermione did seem to not be talking about something, she told him, slowly, about all the things that had happened. She also told him that Draco had changed, that they'd gotten to know each other while stuck together. Harry wasn't sure about this though, Draco still took on the same appearances at some times, but other times seemed like a whole different person.

Ron had gone over to the Ravenclaw table to ask Sen some questions and hadn't come back, he glanced over and saw him talking animatedly to her. It felt almost strange to suddenly have Hermione back, for more than a year he'd been going to his classes without her, and hating every moment of it, then suddenly here she was, safe and whole. It had a almost dream-like quality to it, almost like going back in time. Except many things were different, Sen and Draco being the main ones.

"So, how have _you_ been lately?" Hermione asked curiously, "I feel like I've been here the whole year with all that you've told me, but what about_ you_?"

Harry glanced over at Ginny who was sitting with her friends and tried not to blush when he shrugged and said, "Not much. Been keeping up with our studies, homework is harder without you to explain things."

"Lazy bums," she said accusingly, "You and Ron always have been."

Harry grinned and pushed his bangs out of his eyes, taking a last bite of his scrambled eggs before shoving them away, full.

Hermione glanced at the clock in the great hall then made to stand up, "I should go get my books and doing some pre-class studying. Quiz today."

"Since when do you study right before class?" Harry asked, his turn to accuse her.

Hermione bit her lip, thinking, _Since I've needed time to spend with Draco._ She'd done all the studying possible the night before, but small lies didn't hurt now and then. Especially since she didn't think was ready to tell Harry, Ron, or anyone. Draco had told her Sen knew, though she wasn't sure how Sen could have guessed such a thing. Some people had the talent of seeing right into people, maybe Sen was one of them. She was nice enough.

**A/N: Hey guys! I almost have a hundred reviews! Yay! I haven't been on my computer in ages, I was going to get this chapter up the day before yesterday, but so much going on! Freaking HSA's this week at school. Anyway, dedications to:**

**Princess Rinoa**

**SkittlesStar25**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**duochang97**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Snowbear**

**dracohermioneluver**

**Marissa03**

****


	15. Wicca

**Thursday 7:50 am**

Draco was waiting in one of the abandoned hallways, one that wasn't really near anything at all. He was leaning against a wall, staring out a window at the Hogwarts grounds, a thoughtful expression on his face.

"Morning Draco," she said when she was right beside him. He hadn't heard her come up at all and jumped, whipping his head around. He laughed when he saw it was her, but she couldn't help but feel guilty, knowing he'd jumped so bad in reflex like they had down in the tunnels, hundreds of meters beneath the surface.

"Morning love," he said wrapping her up in a hug and spinning her around before kissing her softly on the lips. She felt the tingly, floaty, giddiness wash over her. She leaned closer to him, warmth followed the tingling making her aware of all the places they touched, as she felt hot sweet passion for this person who had once been her most hated enemy. When they pulled apart she laughed, feeling light-headed.

Sunlight poured through the window making Draco's pale blond hair seem almost gold, in contrast to his silvery eyes. She studied his eyes, feeling as though they were looking into each other's souls, all their emotions of pure love, trust, and caring, displayed so openly there. His strong face, defiant, yet somehow, so kind.

Hermione leaned her head against him hearing the steady rhythm of his heart, proving that though he was a Slytherin, he was human like anyone else, with a heart, feelings, and thoughts.

After several minutes of finding happiness solely in each other's presence, Draco spoke up again.

"How are you classes going?" he asked curiously.

"Good, they just started be off where I was, so I have 100% in all my classes seeing as I've taken no tests so far, and in most of them you don't have to get the homework right, you just have to do it. I can't help but feel they're being easy on the whole class so I can have some time to catch up," she told him.

"Hm, I had that feeling too, when I first started," Draco said then added with a teasing smile, "Nothing wrong though if they are. Of course, you being the person you are would not have anyone help you, you must go through life without leaning on everyone, proving you can do it."

"Don't be poetic, learning is important," she said laughingly then said, "And my parents are coming out again to stay for a week."

"They came for a few a week right after we got back, you'd already sunk into your coma then though, I don't know if you remember," Draco told her.

Hermione shrugged, "My father has work, so they probably couldn't have stayed longer, I think he get's a spring break though. We used to always go on vacation to somewhere different every break, and he'd always read all the manuals and stuff and spout off random information about the historic sights and animal and plants."

"I'll bet your one of those blood is thicker than water families," he said jokingly.

Hermione grinned mischievously then said, "Blood is thicker than water, and much tastier."

Draco grinned as well and laughed, "You have a wicked streak my love!"

**Thursday 7:00 pm**

Harry, Ron, Hermione, Draco, and Sen sat quietly on the mossy floor of Firenze's classroom meditating, or attempting to meditate.

Draco felt rather excluded from the group ever since Hermione had woken up, but then he'd never been in their group in the first place. Harry and Ron apparently also decided to spend as much time as possible with Hermione, barely letting her out their site. When Draco was there, Harry and Ron seemed to _try_ to exclude him. He was getting annoyed, especially since he was clearly showing sincere interest in being their friend and in being a nicer person.

He opened his eyes a crack to see everyone else apparently concentrating, or rather not concentrating at all, with their eyes closed. Draco opened his eyes all the way and glanced at Hermione, she was sitting between Harry and Ron, while Draco, Ginny and Sen sat on the other side of the circle. She was looking brilliant, a peaceful and happy expression on her face. Her beautiful hair-which, Draco almost laughed remembering this, he had once teased for being bushy- was as usual pulled back. Bushy wasn't the word he would use to describe it now though, it _was_ bushy, but not really in a bad way, straight hair was worse, when curlier hair was pulled back it looked nice, when straight hair was pulled back it looked like you were bald.

Draco reached out and brushed one of the stray strands behind her ears. Hermione's eyes flickered open. He grinned and held a finger to lips telling her to stay silent, then glanced at Harry and Ron. Blowing a kiss to her, he mouthed I love you.

Hermione smiled and rolled her eyes at him, pretending to be annoyed, but obviously not. She mouthing the same words back, her eyes sparkling, then closed her eyes biting her lip to keep from chuckling. Draco glanced at Harry and Ron again to make sure neither of them had seen any of this, wondering what they would think if they had, before closing his own eyes again.

Half an hour later Sen called to a end of the meditating part of class. Hermione seemed to like Sen rather well, Sen had been cautious at first, knowing she'd kissed Hermione's lover. Hermione had also been uncomfortable having never met Sen before, of course neither had Draco before two weeks ago. Harry and Ron had the chance to get to know her since the school year started, but apparently either hadn't known of the new transferred student, or hadn't really bothered. Draco suspected Sen had confronted Hermione about that kiss as well, and guessed that all was well.

"You guys ever heard of a coven? As long as we're all still at Hogwarts, why don't we form one?" Sen asked with a smile.

"A coven?" Ron questioned curiously.

"It's a wiccan thing, wicca is a religion, mainly for witches and wizards, but muggles can be wiccan also. You invoke magic with your mind as well as spells, which is kind of what we've been doing hear, actually a lot of what I've been telling you about is wiccan, it has a lot to do with calling on magic, using symbols, nature and being a good person and stuff. Some of the soul stuff isn't really wiccan, but we believe in reincarnation and this place kind of like heaven where you kind of gather yourself together before moving on to the next life. Muggles can be wiccan also, doing magic with their mind, without actually being magical themselves. It isn't as accurate, and it's a lot harder, and its more like praying than doing magic, buts its all the same," Sen explained.

"Ah," Ron said, only some of that sinking in apparently, "But what's a coven?"

"A group of witches and wizards that form a group to practice magic," Sen told them, "It also makes us stronger, we can combine spells more easily if we're linked as a coven, probably find a way to get rid of You-Know-Who's soul even."

"So this is what it leads to," Draco said. He saw Harry and Ron glance at him, still unsure of what his role was in this group.

"I know where to find the spells," Hermione said brightly, obviously looking forward to research. Draco grinned and was about to make some comment, when he realized that would sound, way too, like he knew Hermione better than he was letting on.

"So we form a coven and combine our powers using some spells and invoking a gods magic?" Harry asked not quite sure what to make of all this.

Sen nodded, "You guys probably already believe in the Lord and Lady, am I correct? Most witches and wizards do, if they believe in any god at all, kind of like a race thing, like a lot of Indians being Hindus. Except its kind of like a default, the Lord and Lady."

Draco nodded, he had often referred to the lord and the lady, sometimes god though, except god was the lord.

"Why don't you guys go do some research of your own," Sen suggested, "I'm not trying to convert you, you don't have to be wiccan or whatever to form a coven, wiccan mixes in with witches and wizards in general, most of them just aren't practicing wiccans or whatever."

"So we'll talk again tomorrow, same time?" Ginny asked. Harry noticed, speaking up for the first time through the whole lesson. Ginny tended to be like that, shy in big groups, talkative when they were alone. Even though Ron was his best friend, it was Ginny with whom he got into long conversations with. They didn't always talk the whole time though.

**A/N: A lot of talking in this chapter, about ah, wicca and stuff. I studied wiccan for a while, wouldn't say I ever really was one though. It's a interesting religion. The soul stuff though is my own theories that I made, like many humans do in seeking for the answers of life. :-P Thanks for all the reviews I got! They were all really great and inspiring! **

**Dedications To:**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Balsam**

**Marissa03**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**SkittlesStar25**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**shannon**

**CrazyPoet**

**Snowbear**


	16. Memories

**Thursday 11:17 pm**

Hermione sat up in her bed in the girls dormitory. It was her first night out of the hospital wing. She pushed open the curtains from the bed, bringing them all the around to tuck behind the bed. Around her were the sounds of soft breathing, and beyond that silence. The windows let bright moon light shine in. Hermione decided she hated the dark. It was too much like being in the cell again, the curtains around her bed had not helped. This time though, there was a soft mattress instead of straw, and no awful smells, no occasional moans or distant screams. She jumped slightly at a small noise, her brain immediately thinking a intruder, but of course, it was nothing. Then suddenly a sound like a very distant scream, outside, after it went on for another few seconds she realized it was one of the unicorns or pegasi down by Hagrid's hut whinnying. She mentally slapped herself, she had to calm down. Hogwarts was safe, it was only the Forbidden Forest that was not.

Yet, she was not going to get any sleep this way. She eased herself out of bed and slipped on a bathrobe wishing Draco was here. Walking softly on the carpeted floor she headed down to the common room and pointed her wand at the fire place, it burst into flame filling the room with a soft red glow. Beyond the glow though the room was even darker than it had been when she'd entered. A soft meow made her jump again until Crookshanks came up purring noisily and rubbed his head against her legs. She laughed softly relieved to have some other living creature with her, that was awake. Hermione leaned down and picked him up putting him on her lap as she sat down on a chair, stroking his soft fur.

"Miss me boy?" she asked him, he gazed back up at her continuously purring. His eyes narrowed to slits and his mouth seemed to be turned up in a smile.

"I'll take that as a yes," Hermione said then asked, "Harry and Ron take good care of you?"

Crookshanks made no reply except to shift slightly, making himself more comfortable.

**Friday 7:45 am**

Dumbledore stood up at breakfast to announce about You-Know-Who possessing people. The news had previously been flying around the school, and there had been the 8:00 curfew for a long time, but it hadn't really been publicly announced until now.

From now you had to travel in groups of at least two, three if possible, everyone had to know the full body bind that was to be cast if you were sure someone was actually possessed. Everyone was also to know how to take off the charm.

Harry walked down the hallway silently with Ginny, pondering over what the announcement meant. Had Dumbledore not been able to find a way to stop You-Know-Who? Was he waiting for something?

Hermione had eaten breakfast with him and Ron, but then once again left early. She seemed to be wanting to catch up as quickly as possible. He remembered sitting with Malfoy hoping she would wake up. It was strange, thinking of Malfoy has her friend, Hermione hadn't said too much about him, and Harry figured it was because she knew that he wasn't really friends with Malfoy. Throughout his whole time at Hogwarts Malfoy had been an enemy, of his and Hermione's. It gave him a weird feeling to think otherwise.

Harry looked at Ginny who also seemed lost in thought. He took her hand and she glanced at him and smiled.

**Friday 10:15 am**

"Potter, you shall be paired with Crabbe," Snape said, seemingly taking joy in pairing the Gryfindors with Slytherins. Hermione frowned, if there weren't such house rivalry and there were inter-house friendships this wouldn't be a problem. It was so damn racist. Dumbledore was supposed to be smart, couldn't he see this?

"Weasley with Goyle," Snape drawled on. Everyone started getting up and shuffling around to tables with their partners, most of them looking disgusted.

"Granger and Malfoy," he announced. Well, that wasn't so bad. Apparently Snape knew nothing of Draco's changes. Of course, his personality itself hadn't really changed, just the meanness to niceness.

Draco walked over to Hermione's table as Ron and Harry got up to head over to where Goyle was. She smiled at him as he sat down and he grinned then glanced around the classroom.

"Wonder what they'll all think when we don't start bickering," he said just loudly enough for her to hear.

"Probably that we're simply ignoring each other," Hermione said as she pulled the slugs over to slice them up into smaller pieces. They lay there limply, already dead, helpless to whatever might be done to them. A soft buzzing filled her ears. She took out the knife, but found she couldn't lower it to the slug. Hermione grit her teeth as an onrush of memories she'd been trying hard not to think about flooded her vision. She tried to yell out, to tell them to stay away, but she couldn't. Roaring filled her ears as she found the world going black.

Hermione woke up on the cold floor of the potions room. Faces crowded around, she blinked a few times then managed to pick out Harry, Ron, and Draco kneeling by her, identical expressions of worry. Snape's greasy head stood over the other students.

"Why doesn't one of you escort Ms. Granger to the infirmary," he said. Hermione felt uncomfortable under the stares of the other students and her head hurt from where it had hit the floor.

"I will," Draco said quickly, Harry had just opened his mouth to volunteer himself and looked a bit ruffled with the idea that Draco wanted to.

"Professor Snape"- Harry started, but Snape interrupted him.

"Thank-you Mr. Malfoy," he said without a glance at Harry.

Draco reached out a hand to pull Hermione to her feet, which she gratefully took. She leaned on him for a moment before she could catch her balance then blinked a few times to clear her sight.

"Are you okay?" Harry asked as Snape started shooing everyone back to their seats. Hermione nodded and said, "I'm fine."

Harry obviously didn't believe her and neither did Draco. He led Hermione outside leaving Harry behind.

"Are you sure you're okay?" he asked once they started walking down the hallway.

Hermione shrugged and bit her lip then said, "Memories. I just suddenly- couldn't take it."

Draco put an arm around her comfortingly and hugged her close, "You'll be alright. Tell me about it."

"It was awful," Hermione said frowning, "I don't see how anyone, could be so vile. I was helpless."

"I think we should sign up for counseling," Draco said stating his earlier thoughts, "People always say its good to talk about it, that you need to get it out It'll be good for us."

Hermione made a face then said, "I'm not sure I want to talk about it."

"It's good for you whether or not you want to talk about it," Draco told her, "To confront it and put it behind you."

"I don't want to confront it," Hermione said narrowing her eyes then looking at Draco her eyes afraid, "I can't. You saw what happened just now. Why me? Why did this have to happen to me? What did it have to happen at all?"

Draco stopped walking and pulled her into a tight hug as she buried her face against his chest and silent sobs wracked her body.

"Shhh, shhh, its okay," he whisper stroking her hair, "I've gone through things also, I'm not over it, I don't sleep at night. These things just happen. If anyone's to blame it's You-Know-Who, and we're gonna defeat him by the end of this year."

Soon Hermione looked up at him and took a deep breath and mumbled something.

"Hm?" Draco asked.

"Just telling myself I can get through this," Hermione said with a slight smile then added, "We'll get through it."

"That's the spirit," Draco said also smiling as they started walking again.

**A/N: Anyone ever read "Speak"? I kinda realized this story's similar to that book in some ways. This story, like Dungeon, is ending too quickly, there was a lot of other stuff I was thinking of including, which makes me start thinking about a third one. This one's plot is more about Voldemort and not about the houses and stuff, so if I did write a third one it'd be about that, and Hermione fully recovering and where their relationship ends up and whether or not they take another year at Hogwarts and what Harry and Ginny and Ron and Sen all do. What do you guys think?**

**Dedications To:**

**Princess Rinoa**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Marissa03**

**SkittlesStar25**

**CrazyPoet**

**Balsam**

**dracohermioneluver**

**Dreammergurl2007**

****


	17. Slytherins

**Saturday 7:34 am**

Draco felt himself dragged out of bed by several hands, but chose to keep his eyes close, feigning the sleep that he had not gotten the previous night. He landed on the floor of the Slytherin dormitory with a thud and felt someone kick him in the side.

"Get up lazybones," a voice said. Draco opened his eyes. Above him was a group of not friendly looking slytherins.

"Good morning to you too," Draco retorted. The slytherin sneered.

"We've seen you with Potter and Weasley, with Gryfindors," another one said, getting right to the point.

"So kill me," Draco said, then realized that probably wasn't a very good thing to say.

"Get up," the apparent leader said. Draco shifted through his memory for names of the slytherins and finally recognized him as Terah. Behind him was Tobias, Romeo, and Merlin. The last had been quite teased with the name his parents had loaded on him, actually, Draco had done a lot of that teasing.

Draco obliged to their request and stood up, readying himself for a fight, which probably what the four were planning. Beat him up some, knock some 'sense' into his head. Draco was sure he wouldn't win, but knew either way it wouldn't stop him from doing what he wanted.

Romeo lunged at him swinging a fast punch at his head, Draco ducked, but Rome's leg came up and kneed him in the stomach. Draco gasped, the breath knocked out of him, but managed and trip him then land a hard kick in the groin. Romeo doubled up and in a moment Tobias, Terah, and Merlin were all over him. Every part of his body was being battered, he landed a few kicks and punches, but being outnumbered one to four, very quickly lost ground. They dragged him out of the dormitory and pushed him down the stairs into the common room.

Draco heard of few murmurs of surprise before he saw the four boys come down the stairs behind him. He pulled himself to his feet and managed to throw Terah to the ground and push Merlin into a sofa, before they began teaming up on him again.

This time though, he heard the other slytherins protesting. Draco didn't deserve it. They didn't need to beat him up. He'd been through enough with You-Know-Who. Then contradicting ones, His being down in You-Know-Who's dungeons being a lie, he was betraying the Slytherins, he deserved exactly what he got.

The fight apparently was broken up by the more open-minded Slytherins, but Draco was hurting to much to pay much attention and simply closed his eyes, half fainting and half falling asleep.

**3:02 pm**

"Draco?" Draco heard a voice say. He blinked a few times to see a pair of beautiful eyes staring down at him. He squinted then managed to get his eyes open all the way, the left one hurt, actually a lot of him hurt.

"What happened?" the person asked, he now realized was Hermione.

"Ah, I fell," he mumbled, still waking up, and not wanting to blame anyone in particular.

"A couple slytherins brought you in here, more like dragged you in here, you were out cold," she explained.

"Most of them are sensible, of course you never hear about the good Slytherins, just the bad ones, but what house doesn't have its annoying people?" Draco asked easing up into a sitting position. He stretched out his arms noticing various bruises and scrapes on them, luckily he had no casts or bandages, nothing was broken.

"Your getting off topic, let me guess, the floor someone punched you in the eye and scraped you up plenty good as well as bruising you in various places?" Hermione asked with a slight smile.

Draco grinned then shrugged, "I fell _down the stairs_?"

"Come on, why don't you want the people who beat you up to get in trouble?" Hermione asked.

"That's not the kind of thing you do, makes you seem, oh I don't know. I don't think they'll do it again, it was just kind of a, welcome back to Slytherin," Draco told her.

"Some welcome," Hermione said, "We've both been in the infirmary in the past 48 hours."

"Are _you_ okay?" Draco asked, his turn to be concerned.

"Better," she said simply.

"I wonder if Pomfrey will let me leave," Draco said, "Somewhere we can talk by ourselves."

"Let's just leave," Hermione suggested, "She won't notice."

Draco grinned, "No longer a goody-good?"

"Nope," Hermione said smiling back and giving him a quick kiss on the lips before standing back to let him get up. Draco slipped off the traditional pajama shirt that was part of the garb they were dressed in the infirmary and reached for his robes at the end of his bed. Hermione glanced at his chest, blushing slightly, then noticed the long scars running down it. She reached out and touched them softly. Draco glanced at her then said, "The burns. I'll probably have them a long time."

"They're kind of striking you know, like battle scars in a sexy kind of way," Hermione said with a grin. Draco took her hand softly, lifting it to his lips to kiss. After a moment of silence Draco pulled his robe over himself then stood up and slid the pj pants out from underneath his robe. Hermione handed him his jeans which he pulled on as well before slipping his feet into his shoes.

**6:00 pm**

"Five more people were possessed today," Sen announced in Firenze's classroom. They'd decided to hold practice early in order to the library and do some research.

"Five?" Ron asked incredulously. Sen shrugged.

"You think he's trying to do something within the school? Like have the found any spells in the working or something?" Harry asked.

"He doesn't have enough power in the bodies of students," Draco said making a guess.

"So who's the strongest wizard the in school?" Ginny asked. They all glanced at Harry.

Harry shook his head, "Not me, he wants to kill me. Dumbledore."

"You think he'll actually try to possess Professor Dumbledore?" Hermione asked then said, "Dumbledore is too strong, he won't be able to."

"If that's even what he's planning," Sen said. Everyone was silent for a little bit, each lost in their own thoughts.

"Let's worry about strengthening our own minds and finding a way to trap him," Sen said with a slight smile, "Today I was thinking we'll send numbers instead of colors. Mainly because there are a lot more numbers than colors, but we'll just start with one through ten. Who wants to send?"

"I will," Ginny said then closed her eyes. The other did the same.

**A/N: Seventeen chapters! If you guys have any ideas for a sequel to this one, that would make these a trilogy, feel free to say so. I don't have enough to work with currently, but the ideas are slowly building up. I've already typed several chapters ahead, but I didn't want to bombard you with a whole bunch of chapters at once! :-P And I'm too lazy to upload more than one chapter at a time.**

**Dedications:**

**Crazy Poet**

**SkittlesStar25**

**TKPIper**

**dracohermioneluver**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Marissa03**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Snowbear**


	18. Can't Think Of a Name For This Chapter

**Saturday 6:10 pm**

Harry sat in the great hall across from Ginny, finishing up his food and shoving the plate away. He brushed his hair out of his eyes for the millionth time then looked at Ginny. She glanced up at him and grinned, she'd apparently finished eating before and was holding open a book, but she now closed it and put it in her bag.

"Hey Ginny, what do you think of Draco?" Harry asked, as his brain had been pondering this all day. Draco's change was stunning, and hard to accept. Harry kept finding himself starting to say nasty things to him, before remembering that as long as Draco was being nice, he could be nice as well.

"As in now?" Ginny asked and Harry nodded.

"He's changed a lot I suppose," Ginny said stating Harry's thoughts, "I didn't really know him as well as you guys did though."

"Well, what about how he and Hermione became friends," Harry said, wanting to know Ginny's thoughts on this. He couldn't help but wonder if the change had been sudden or if Hermione had worked the change on him. Hermione was very hesitant to say much about anything about what happened down there.

"They seem to know each other pretty well, Hermione disappear sometimes you know, I think she goes and talks to him," Ginny said.

Harry raised his eyebrows then thought back and realized that he hadn't really been spending that much time with her. He immediately felt guilty, realizing he'd been spending so much with Ginny that he'd rather abandoned Ron and Hermione. What was Ron doing through all this time?

**11:56 pm**

Hermione lay awake in bed staring into the darkness of the room. Finally not being able to take it anymore she stood up pulling on her robes and headed down into the common room. The fires were still lit, apparently someone was up, of course it was Saturday.

She padded softly down the stairs making no noise, hoping not to be noticed by whoever it was that was up. She was about to slip out of the common room when she thought she heard Harry's voice. She turned and realized it was Harry and Ginny sitting in front of the fire, talking softly. She paused, looking out into the dark hallways, and glanced back once more before stepping outside.

After walking a few steps down the hallway she thought back and realized that the second time she'd glanced back they hadn't been talking, in fact it'd looked like they were kissing. She stopping walking and turned around thinking of going back in there and asking them, but then realized, it was late at night, she'd probably imagined it.

Hearing a soft creak behind her she startled and nearly screamed then caught herself and stood still, her heart pounding. Then she bit her lip angrily, it had been nothing, the castle was old. She hated feeling so jumpy all the time, they used to into the forbidden forest at night, she could walk through the hallways! Then again, their wanderings in the forbidden forest had been what got her stuck down there in first place. She brushed a strand of hair behind her ears before she could start thinking about that and concentrated on where she was going. She realized she'd started heading for the lesser used part of the castle and soon found herself a door that had inconveniently been locked the last time she and Draco had walked by here. She pushed on it, and to her surprise it opened. Peering into the looming darkness she pulled out her wand and said lumos. In the soft light of her wand she saw stairs leading upwards, a tower probably. She was thinking of going back to the common room when she heard some footsteps and the grating voice of Filch. Without a second thought she slipped in and closed the door behind her heading up the stairs, hoping that Filch would not find the door unlocked and either come up the stairs and find her or lock the door trapping her in, unless he didn't magically lock it.

The stairs twisted around until she nearly bumped her head on a trap door, she pushed it open hesitantly to find herself at the top of a tower at the edge of the castle. The landscape unfolded before her, glowing white in the light of the moon. She walked to the edge and leaned on the wall closing her eyes softly and listening to the warm night breeze. The tower seemed abandoned and unused, luckily enough. Under the night sky she felt herself relaxing, her mind starting to drift, the tension easing out of it. And then, whether it was for happiness at being at Hogwarts again, at being in love, whether it was from sadness and stress, or both, she started crying. It felt good though, to let it all out, as though with her tears flowed memories, good ones and bad.

**Sunday 12:20 am**

Hermione stepped softly down the stairs pushing open the door, glad to find it unlocked after all. Filch was now no where in sight or sound, nor was Ms. Norris. She walked carefully down the hallways, keep her wand lit in front of her, making the hallways beyond the light seem even darker, but illuminating the area around her nicely.

After wandering a bit she realized she was in the deeper part of the school. The air cooler with a slightly wet smell of soft earth beyond the stones. The Slytherin dungeon was somewhere around here. As if in answer to her thoughts she heard the grating of stone against stone and felt her heart leap. If that was the dungeon door, it could be Draco or some Slytherin, if it wasn't, who knows what was wandering around down here?

She canceled the Lumos spell on her wand but kept it out in front of her as she edged quietly towards the sound of the door. When she came around the corner she saw a figure in a robe standing in the middle of the hallway. The wall behind him looked perfectly normal, probably the entrance though.

"Hello?" she asked softly. The person startled jerking his head around to look at her.

"Hermione?" he asked, and she immediately recognized the voice as Draco's. She grinned and ran up to him hugging him tightly.

"I take it your are Hermione then," he whispered softly in her ear with a soft chuckle. Then in the darkness of the unlit hallways he pressed his lips against hers, kissing her softly. Hermione kissed him back more firmly moving her arms up to wrap around his neck, feeling passion for him burn throughout her body. They finally broke apart gasping but a moment later Hermione pulled him back kissing him lightly this time.

"I love you," she whispered when they stopped, slightly out of breath.

"I love you too," Draco whispered bac, "You're perfect, the most amazing person I've ever known."

Hermione smiled feeling her heart lift in that time when she could forget everything except herself and Draco. She closed her eyes blissfully and leaned her head against his shoulder.

"There's always something good that comes out of the bad," he said thoughtfully. Hermione paused then glanced up at him, stopping to think.

"Yes, I suppose so," Hermione said, "I'd have never loved you if, if I hadn't got stuck down there."

"That doesn't matter though," Draco said reassuringly, seemingly reading her thoughts, knowing that what happened down there had been hard, "What matters is now, living life as it comes. Nothing will change that."

"Thank-you," Hermione told him, "for, helping me, through all this."

"I should thank-you," Draco said, "I don't know what would have happened to me without you either."

Hermione grinned then laughed, "Its so late. I need to sleep."

"Come on," Draco said turning back to the wall, "The slytherins always sleep til noon. We could use each other's comfort I think."

Hermione nodded and followed him into the Slytherin common room, smiling as she wondered how many Gryfindors ever saw the comfortable black leather sofa's and deep green rugs. Draco led her up the stairs into his dormitory where they slipped into his bed holding each other close as they let sleep drift over them.

**A/N: I think I got this chapter up quicker than normal, unless I didn't. Only two more days of school left! Yay! Yeah, that was a random comment. I've had one person say they liked the idea of a third one.. what does everyone else think? Because if I don't write a third one, this one is going to be even longer than was going to be, well maybe just an extra chapter. Well, dedications to:**

**Balsam**

**Saiya-jin- Patricia**

**Snowbear**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Crazy Poet**

**Marissa03**

**SkittlesStar25**

**Princess Rinoa**


	19. Care of Magical Creatures Class

**Monday 9:30**

Draco trudged across the damp grass to Care of Magical Creatures. Unluckily the game keeper Hagrid was still teaching it. Just as long as they didn't have to associate with dangerous creatures. He'd really used that situation to its max, Madame Pomfrey could mend scratches in a second. His arm had been fully better in one hour. The guy had never been a teacher before though, probably knew a lot about magical creatures, just wasn't very good with a class.

"Wonder what we're doing today with the big oaf," a slytherin said walking up next to him. Draco shrugged, dismissing the comment about him being a big oaf. Big yes, oaf, well maybe not.

"Hopefully something interesting," Draco said, "You're in my year?"

The slytherin nodded, "I'm Cameo."

"Nice to meet you," Draco said, wondering how it was he didn't even know someone in his own year. Approaching the small wooden building that had recently been installed for that class. Draco spotted some small cages with rats, a few bats, and some lizards.

"Magical pets perhaps?" Draco suggested walking over to the bat cage looking at them curiously. Cameo shrugged and ran a hand through his dark hair.

"Lizards, sweet," Cameo said reaching his hand in to touch one lightly on the head. A moment later he yelped pulling his finger back very quickly, now with a blackish lizard attached to it. Draco laughed as Cameo shook his finger furiously trying to get it off. Hagrid chose to step out of his hut at that time. He frowned seeing the lizard hanging onto Cameo's finger. Draco hid a smile.

"I'd rather ye' not touch the animals before I come out," he said speaking slowly as he always did, "Some of them can be right dangerous."

The lizard dropped off Cameo's finger back into the tank then turned its head and hissed at him.

"Right, let's get started," Hagrid started but was interrupted by a sudden sound like a whip cracking the air. Several of the slytherins jumped and immediately backed away from a spot where one of the tank had shattered. A boy with blond hair and a normally quiet demeanor was standing there. He turned around and Draco realized right away that it was You-Know-Who.

Hagrid's eyes widened and he spoke quickly, "I'll handle this."

Then the boy laughed deeply making everyone shiver, then pointed his wand at Hagrid. Hagrid reached for his own wand, but the boy/Voldemort turned his wand to a student and murmured, "Avada Kadavra."

A bolt of violent green light whipped through the air striking a girl. She collapsed almost immediately. Hagrid lept for You-Know-Who but by the time he'd grabbed the boy and his wand, he'd gone limp.

The lizards from the glass tank that had been shattered started scurrying around. Hagrid yelled and told everyone to go inside, which of course no one did. In a moment a lizard lept up, surprisingly agile, and curled up into a little ball and started zipping around, tearing up the earth it touched. Then as the other lizards started doing the same, the slytherins moved, and fast. Draco caught a glimpse of the daggers now raised on their backs as one rolled past the door. Hagrid picked up the boy, and girl that had been struck and brought them inside on some soft chairs.

A moment later Hagrid had them all in a new tank, and the lizards apparently now calm were basking on the rocks, eyes closed sleepily. A very white-faced slytherin class came carefully outside again. Hagrid went in carrying the girl and being followed by the boy who looked very pale and confused.

"Those are called rock-rollers," Hagrid said as he started walking up towards the castle, "They're quite easy to take care of once ya know how, but I'm canceling class for today so we can finish up next time."

"Easy!" someone said scoffing.

"Ya just pick them up by their tails and their whole body goes limp, don't hurt 'em at all," Hagrid said, "They live in rocks, digging holes in them, quite nasty to get a infestation of these in a stone castle. Filch recently cleared these ones out," Hagrid explained, "The rolling is a defense against predators and the way they make shelters. Live in large groups like rabbits sort of, the holes they make are called warrens. Extremely smart little guys though. Nasty bite they can give as well."

The class silently followed Hagrid up the castle. Cameo glanced at his finger which was now bruised, though surprisingly it hadn't drawn any blood.

Later Draco learned that the girl hadn't been killed, You-Know-Who simply didn't have enough power in the body of a mere student and didn't yet have enough power to take over a teacher.

**12:05**

Hermione, Harry, and Ron sat at the Gryffindor table talking worriedly about You-Know-Who's presence in the school. Eight other people had been possessed that day.

"His power's growing," Harry said biting his lip.

"Dumbledore will make him go away," Hermione said with a encouraging smile, "No one's been hurt."

"Yet," Ron said.

"Don't be so pessimistic," Hermione scolded him.

"I don't even know what that means!" Ron exclaimed then added, "Well, Sen knows so much about souls and stuff, why don't we see if she knows a way of getting him to leave."

"I think she's been looking," Ginny said sitting down next to Harry who glanced at her and grinned.

"We can look also, can't we?" Hermione asked.

"Research, Hermione's favorite thing," Harry said jokingly.

Hermione smiled then stood up, "I'm gonna go now, do some catch-up work and stuff."

"Okay," Ron said. Harry turned to start talking to Ginny and Ron started putting some more food on his plate.

Hermione picked up her bag and walked over to the Slytherin table where she leaned over to whisper something into Draco's ear. A moment later he nodded.

"Ugh, that still gives me a creepy feeling," Harry said watching Hermione talking quietly to Draco.

"Look at how close she's leaning to him," Ron commented.

Ginny shrugged, "Really, they're friends at the least. Draco may actually be a really nice person and it seems like she really likes him."

"At the least?" Harry asked.

Ginny shrugged, "Who knows? They _were_ together for quite a few months. You can get to know someone really well."

"You can't possibly be suggesting," Harry said with a disbelieving look, "She would have told us by now."

"Well, maybe they're not the only ones keeping a secret," Ginny said giving Harry a look. Harry bit his lip with a grin then glanced at Ron, who was still watching Hermione.

**A/N: Thank you all for reviewing! I'd like to dedicate this chapter to:**

**CrazyPoet**

**duochang97**

**SkittlesStar25**

**Sila-chan**

**Saiya-jin Patricia**

**dracohermioneluver**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Dreammergurl2007**

****


	20. A Abandoned Tower

**Monday 12: 15 pm**

"The tower is this way," Hermione said leading Draco towards the door that she had found unlocked the day before. She reached the door and pushed it open, glad to find it still unlocked.

"So this is what, our own secret tower?" Draco asked with a grin, slipping an arm around her as they climbed up the spiraling steps.

"Yep," Hermione said, "As far as I can tell its not used at all."

"Wow," Draco said as they stepped out onto the top, "The view's amazing."

"My parents are coming the day after tomorrow," Hermione told him leaning her head on his shoulder.

"That's great!" Draco said turning to kiss her forehead softly.

"I think Harry is a little bit weirded out from the sudden transition of you from enemy to my friend," Hermione said.

"More than friends," Draco said.

"Exactly why I can't see how we're ever going to tell them," Hermione said and Draco felt her frown, "They're reactions have been okay so far, but who knows, I'm sure Harry will blow up."

"We can manage it, normal life should be easy," Draco said with a slight smile then touched her chin softly turning it up so he was looking into her eyes, "I love you."

"I love you too," Hermione said feeling her heart rise, she _did _love him, and that was all that mattered, "I don't see how I can feel so happy, yet other times so awful."

Draco said nothing instead kissing her on the lips pulling her closely. She leaned into the kiss closing her eyes.

**6:30 pm**

Ron entered Firenze's classroom carrying a stack of large books with he dropped down onto the moss floor. Sen glanced up from her log.

"I thought you'd be here," Ron said smiling slightly, then glanced at the books, "Books on souls and stuff. I was thinking about getting You-Know-Who to leave, and since you know the most of all of us..."

"Yeah," Sen said with a grin, "Haven't seen much of you guys recently, especially Draco. How's he doing?"

Ron shrugged, "He's not really, our friend.. just kind of Hermione's."

Sen grinned and bit her lip looking up, "You guys don't know?"

"Know what?" Ron asked.

"Ah, never mind," Sen said standing up and picking up one of the books.

"Where'd you get these?" she asked curiously, "I've looked for some in the library, but I didn't see very many."

"Er, the restricted section," Ron said, "I think its because they don't want students learning how to like do too much stuff with mind stuff or something."

"Shall we start looking through them?" Sen asked, "We can teach shielding your mind, but I know You-Know-Who gets stronger every time he possesses someone, he draws a little bit of their strength with them. One of these days he'll take a teacher, then move on to Dumbledore, or try to kill Harry and other people on the way. Ron, a lot of people don't notice this, but the situation is very steadily getting worse."

Ron nodded seriously then opened another book, "So should I be looking for stuff like mass shielding and trapping souls or minds or whatever?"

Sen nodded and sat down next to him flipping through the book she'd picked up, pulling over a piece of parchment to take notes, "Hopefully we can gather enough information to put together a way to trap him."

Ron nodded copying Sen's example.

**8:15 pm**

"Hey Ron, do you think there's something more going on between Hermione and Draco?" Harry asked as they did their potions homework.

Ron glanced up and gave a tentative shrug, "Its not really our business though is it?"

"But, Draco, you know. How do we even know he _is_ nice, he could be pretending or something," Harry said.

Ron shrugged again then said, "I don't think he'd do that. Too much work, and he's not really getting too much out of it."

"Except Hermione," Harry said. Ron made a face.

"Sen and I found some good information," Ron finally said, changing the subject, "We should be able to put together a good spell soon."

"That's good," Harry said, "Well I'm going to get dinner, haven't had a chance to this evening."

Ron raised an eyebrow but kept any comments to himself as Harry gathered his books up and left.

Hermione came in a moment later looking flushed and happy and sat down next to Ron.

"Hey Hermione," he said, "Been at the library?"

"Ah no, I don't have any homework, I'm forbidden to any, or do much of anything in classes except watch. They want me to take it easy the rest of this year," she said, "We've been thinking of taking a half year or summer classes in order to make up what we missed."

"We?" Ron asked curiously.

"Draco and I," Hermione said then bit her lip and said, "So, how's it been going lately?"

"Been doing a lot of research on souls and stuff," Ron said, "Trying to find a way to stop You-Know-Who."

"I can't help but wonder whether it was really a good thing when those rocks crushed his body, if he'd still been alive, he'd be easier to kill. You can't kill souls," Hermione said, her face darkening as she thought about the dungeons.

"What was it like down there?" Ron asked softly, knowing he was treading on thin ice.

"Awful," Hermione said getting a glazed look in her eyes, "Screams and moans, I can still hear them at night. It was a place full of suffering and horror. I can't believe how people could so readily join his side, how they so quickly revert to such, ways, given a chance."

Her gaze stared off into the distance, Ron touched her should softly.

"They revel in pain, in other people's misery. Did you know they burnt Draco with a red hot poker, straight out of the fire?" Hermione asked.

Ron shook his head, "Draco hasn't really said anything, I mean he's not really, our friend."

"They tortured you?" Ron asked carefully. Hermione nodded and sighed pursing her lips then said, "I'd rather not talk about that."

Ron got the feeling there was something she wasn't telling, but let it drop at that.

"Oh, and by the way, do you think there's something going on between Harry and Ginny?" Hermione asked her face changing as she switched to a lighter topic.

Ron raised his eyebrows then shrugged, "There had better not be. If he's kissing my little sister... why do you think that?"

"Oh, just Harry's not around that much, and I saw them talking this one night, but I was sleepy, so I could have been mistaken," Hermione said, "but I think they _were_ kissing. They do seem closer."

"So do you and Malfoy, er Draco," Ron said then coughed wishing he hadn't said that.

"Hm?" Hermione asked.

Ron shook his head, "Never mind."

**A/N: Soul is getting close to being over, ten more chapters perhaps? I'm also thinking of writing a different Hermione/Draco story, un Dungeon/Soul related. I also might change my user name from Stormy Phoenix to Tiger Lily or something, so be on the look-out. :-)**

**Dedications to:**

**SkittlesStar27**

**Snowbear**

**Marissa03**

**Crazy Poet**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Balsam**

**dracohermioneluver**

****

****


	21. One Secret Uncovered

**Tuesday 5:30 pm**

Draco watched Hermione sitting next to Harry and Ron, wearing that strong face of hers, her chin held high. He knew though that inside she was still raw from the experience. How she managed to appear, to be, so strong was beyond him. She was amazing, strong, brilliant, beautiful. There wasn't enough words to describe her. He wished he could walk down there and sit next to her and take her up in his arms, kiss her, tell her he loved her. Then there was Harry and Ron, and the rest of the school. Was this how Romeo and Juliet had felt? From enemy houses, the only ones who saw through the stupidity of the feud.

Finally she stood up and started heading towards to the doors to the great hall where he stood. He stepped back then the moment she turned he stepped forward and wrapped his arms around her from behind, taking her hands in his own and kissing her neck softly.

"Draco?" she asked turning her head to look at him a, laughing smile on her face, "You shouldn't do that here, anyone could coming walking down the hallways and see us."

"Who cares?" Draco said grinning.

Hermione shook her head, "You have no self-restraint. I thought we didn't want anyone to know about us, until we were ready to tell them."

"I love you too much," Draco said seriously, but with a grin on his face, "I can't bear the thought of ever letting you go."

Hermione laughed then turned around in his arms wrapping her own arms around him.

"You'll have to let go of me at some point or I won't be able to go my classes," she told him answering his statement literally.

"Oh shit," Draco said and pushed her behind the thick doors as Harry and Ron's voices drifted out of the great hall. Hermione found herself pressed rather tightly up against Draco behind the door as Harry and Ron seemingly very slowly walked out of the great hall and turned down a hallway. When all noises of them had gone they both burst out laughing. A moment later Draco found himself silenced when Hermione kissed him.

The light rather giddy kiss quickly changed into a deeply passionate kiss making them both keenly aware of how close they were to each other. Their breath came quickly as they embraced each other, kissing as though they might never see each other again, as if it were their last kiss.

Finally they both broke apart, stepping out from behind the door, a little embarrassed by the heat of the kiss. Hermione grinned and touched his face softly staring into his eyes in that way that made Draco feel as though she was staring straight into his soul. And it was a good feeling because there was no uneasiness between them. They could both be exactly themselves and knew that the other loved them just as much, no matter what.

**6:17 pm**

"Apparently everyone is having secret affairs," Ron said when Sen walked into Firenze's classroom carrying a bag of odd objects which she dumped out onto some grass.

"Everyone?" Sen asked curiously.

Ron smiled, "Hermione thinks there may be something between Harry and Ginny, and Harry thinks there might be something between Draco and Hermione."

Sen smiled and shrugged.

"I'm not sure about Harry and Ginny, and I can't imagine Draco and Hermione, together, like that," Ron said then asked, "Do you know anything?"

"I'd rather not say," Sen said knowing that if Draco hadn't told anyone about himself and Hermione, he wouldn't want her to either.

"What does that mean?" Ron asked, "You _do_ know something?"

"I told you, I'm not saying anything. My lips are sealed," she said with a slight smile and then sat down next to him to start digging through the pile of orbs and carvings.

"So how come you weren't at Hogwarts before?" Ron asked peering at her pile curiously.

"I transferred from a public wizard school," Sen told him, "Didn't I tell you that?"

Ron shrugged, "If you did, I can't remember. And, what's all that?"

"Things that could be useful in helping with the spell," Sen said, "Trap his soul in an orb or something, I don't know. Random ideas."

"Ah," Ron said then stretched his arms, "I've been taking notes for about an hour now, want to go for a walk?"

"Sure, I don't know what I'd do with this stuff anyway," she said then added, "We can probably leave it here for now. I asked Firenze the other day and he seemed perfectly eager to help all he could. Have you taken any of his classes? Much more, um, I don't know, better than Professor Trewlawny's. She may be seer, but I don't think her classes are really that realistic."

"I don't know," Ron said, "I've been taking Divination, only had him when Trewlawny was fired."

Ron stood up and gave Sen a hand, pulling her to her feet as well before they headed out the door, down the hallways and outside.

The sun was still well up, the days getting longer as April turned into May and the air grew hotter. They headed around the castle walls towards the extensive gardens in the courtyards, where the air was cooler, shadowed from the sun and held in by the rocks. Other students wandered around, a few couples, some doing homework, some friends playing chess.

Sen suddenly stopped as she came around a bend, then shoved Ron back who tripped slightly in surprise.

"What?" he asked.

"Don't look now," Sen said turning to face him, "But I think some of your suspicions were right."

"Draco and Hermione?!" Ron asked incredulous.

"No! Harry and Ginny," Sen said with a grin then added, "And be quiet, you don't want them to know we're hear do you?"

"Yes, I do," Ron said stepping forward, "That's my little sister!"

"Ron!" Sen said grabbing his arm and pulling him back, "She's older than you might think. Let her make her own choices in life, you don't have to protect her from your best friend."

"I can't believe Harry," Ron said darkly, but had relaxed. He peered around the hedge then looked back at Sen with a half frown half thoughtful look. He sighed obviously unsure of his feelings, he trusted Harry well enough, but didn't like the idea of him going off and kissing his little sister without telling him.

"Come on Ron," Sen said pulling him off in the other direction, "You can talk to Harry about that later."

**A/N: Took a little bit longer than normal in getting this chapter up, but here it is! I'm dedicating this chapter to:**

**Princess Rinoa**

**CrazyPoet**

**SkittlesStar25**

**dracohermioneluver**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Marissa03**

**Snowbear**


	22. Shadows

**Wednesday 3:25 pm**

Draco leaned against the stone of the castle, staring down at the lake, which had become rather popular with the heat coming in. Hermione, Ron, and Sen were all swimming and Draco longed to go join them, but knew he'd be rejected, perhaps not orally, but never the less. Only Hermione would be glad to have him there. He longed to be with her every moment of the day, feeling his heart ache whenever she wasn't near, though he tried to remind himself that she was in the same building, they could be apart for a few hours.

Hermione looked stunning in the hot afternoon sun sitting on the dock letting her feet dangle in the water, unsure about how cold it was. Her hair was tied back loosely, several strands dangling free and others straining to do the same. She wore a one piece bathing suit that fit her form nicely. She'd gained weight in the past weeks since getting out of You-Know-Who's lair, and even more since she'd come out of her coma, no longer pale, malnourished and underweight. Her skin was still fairly white, but then neither of them had had much of a chance to get out in the sun, her cheeks had a soft red flush to them though.

Ron nearly choked when Sen splashed some water right in his face and he quickly splashed some back in her direction but she'd already disappeared underwater again.

"Hey Ron, watch out! I think the giant squid is coming!" he heard Hermione shout then a soft splash as she slipped into the water.

"So why'd you just get in?" he asked then felt something pull his ankle, jerking him underneath briefly. He moved his arms about trying to grab Sen without going under water.

Hermione laughed and went under coming up with her hair sopping which she pushed behind her ears. A moment later Ron felt himself fully dragged under and he kicked his legs reaching down to grab Sen's arm only to have it slip out of his grasp. He came up and saw Sen surface a few yards away.

"You're like a fish!" he accused faking anger.

"More like an otter I'd think," Hermione said with a smile, "Didn't Harry say he was coming?"

Sen nodded then said, "He's probably with Ginny. I think he was going to bring her along as well."

Ron coughed again and Hermione looked at him questioningly.

"We found them, kissing," Ron explained to her. Hermione 'ah-ed' and nodded.

"So they are together!" she said then looked at him again curiously, "How do you feel about it?"

Ron shrugged, "A little angry. I think I want to talk to Ginny, I don't think she's even told Mom, because then I'd know also, you know how things get around."

"Reminds me, my parents are coming up today at 4:30," Hermione told them, "They're probably going to stay the rest of the school year."

"That's good then!" Sen said, "They did come up once when you were in your, um, coma, you probably won't remember that though."

Hermione shrugged, "I can't really remember much."

Ron once again got the feeling Hermione wasn't telling them something, that perhaps she did remember lots, but didn't want to talk about it. He left it at that and instead climbed up onto the dock to jump in, splashing Sen and Hermione.

Hermione found herself wishing Draco was there, but wasn't sure how Harry and Ron would feel about spending so much time with Draco. They both seemed to be handling it okay, but Hermione could feel the tension between them.

"Hermione! Ron! Sen!" Harry yelled, grinning as he came running down the slight slope to the lake, with Ginny running behind him, a grin on her face as well.

"Hey Harry," Hermione said as he walked onto the dock. Ginny hung her towel on one of the dock's posts next to where Harry had dropped his. The sun shone hotly down and Hermione sunk a little lower in the water, hoping the spell she'd done to protect them from getting sunburnt would work. Harry got in slowly while Ginny dived in then came up and pulled Harry the rest of the way in. He yelped upon hitting the water and curled up sinking to the bottom before standing up and shaking the water out of his hair.

Glancing up towards the castle she caught a glimpse of Draco standing near the doors his gaze fixed on her. She blushed and caught his eye, he raised his eyebrows questioningly and she grinned nodding her head slightly, saying that she'd finish swimming soon and come see him. Hermione watched as he disappeared back inside the castle.

"Guess he knows Harry and Ron aren't quite comfortable with him yet," Sen said swimming up beside her. Hermione glanced at her and Sen gave a little smile.

"They're both good people though, they'll see how he's like soon enough," Sen continued lowering her voice slightly, "You're lucky to have friends like them, and to have someone like Draco."

Hermione smiled back remembering that Draco had said she had figured out somehow that he loved her, it was nice to know that at least one person knew and accepted it. Of course Sen hadn't been here long enough to develop hate for him or Slytherins.

**3:55 pm**

Hermione climbed up the steps to the top of the tower, knowing she'd find Draco there. It'd become somewhat of a meeting place, and a place they both now went whenever they couldn't sleep or felt the need to get away. The trap door was already open letting sunlight shine down.

Draco leaned down smiling when her saw her and gave her a hand as she stepped up, pulling her into a sweet kiss the moment she was standing.

"I missed you," Hermione said softly

"We've only been apart a few hours," Draco murmured stroking her hair.

"That's too much," Hermione told him, then added, "Remember you said you never wanted to let me go? I don't ever want to let you go either. I want you to stay here, be with your forever."

"I love you," Draco replied kissing her forehead.

"I love you too," Hermione whispered as he kissed her nose then her lips again. She pulled him closer feeling her blood pounding hotly through out her body as their kiss deepened. She felt a distinct dislike for the cloth that was the only thing between them and found her hands moving to pull of Draco's robes as she felt his hands doing the same.

A rumble of thunder seemed to wake them both up and Hermione suddenly stepped back, glancing at the large clouds starting to billow in the distance. Draco blushed furiously seeing his robe tossed aside along with his t-shirt and Hermione, just coming back from swimming, had only her bathing-suit beneath her now shed robe.

"Sorry," he said softly, "I think we got carried away."

"Don't be," she replied, "I was part of it too. Though I don't think I'm ready for..."

"I know," Draco said and leaned down to pick up his shirt.

"Wait," Hermione said reaching for his hand then she reached up and eased the top of her bathing suit down revealing her breasts.

Draco started to open his mouth but Hermione interrupted him, "Call this a sneak preview or something."

"Hermione," Draco said.

"Hold me?" she asked and Draco stepped forward pulling her close. She leaned her head against his bare chest listening to the steady rhythm of his heart. They held each other close like that, skin against skin, until the sun disappeared behind clouds and another rumble of thunder shook the air.

"My parents will be here soon," Hermione told him quietly. Draco nodded and they stepped apart turning around to pull on his shirt and then his robes. Hermione had her robe back on as well when he turned back around.

"You're beautiful," he said and Hermione blushed and bit her lip, smiling. Then Draco asked, "Are you going to tell them? Your parents I mean?"

"About us? Or about, down there?" Hermione asked uncertainly.

"Both I guess," Draco said hugging her reassuringly.

"I don't know, maybe," Hermione said, "I hate thinking about it, I just wish I could erase it from my memory. About you, they don't know you, and I don't think they'd mind too much that I have a boyfriend."

"Not thinking about it won't make it go away, and it won't make it any better either," Draco told her tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ears, "You need to talk about it, let it go, let it out."

"I don't want to though," Hermione said shivering, "I feel like I need to bury it away, but that's what I did before and then well you know what happened."

"Tell them," Draco encourage her, "Your parents are the most important people in your life, they'll be able to help you. You don't have to tell Harry and Ron or anyone, you don't have to talk to me about it, but at least talk to your parents about it."

"Okay," Hermione said, "I will."

"Ask about getting a counselor also," Draco said, "I got counseling slips from the Hogwarts counselor, did you know Hogwarts has one? All we have to do is fill them out."

Hermione nodded, "Okay. I want to get over it, Draco, but it haunts me everywhere I go."

"I know," Draco said, "In every dark corner, I can see them, standing there watching me, watching us."

Hermione buried her face in the front of his robes, but she didn't cry, and Draco held her murmuring softly to her.

**A/N: Sorry for taking so long in getting this chapter up! I was going to put it up a few days ago, but the internet wasn't working and I haven't been on my computer since. Summer vacation and all... I'd like to dedicate this chapter to:**

**Marissa03**

**duochang97**

**SkittlesStar25**

**Balsam**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**may-ann**

**hollyshort13**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Saiya-jin Patricia**

**dracohermioneluver**

****


	23. Summer Plans

**Thursday 3:40**

Hermione had been with her parents all day, giving Draco no chance to meet her anywhere at lunch. Half of him felt frustrated, longing to be with her, but the other half new that she needed to spend time with her parents and he tried to tell himself that. She'd said at breakfast that she'd come and meet him at the tower at 4:30, before dinner, but 4:30 still felt like ages away.

Sighing he started to head toward's Firenze's classroom, to see if anyone was there and if he could help with the making of the spell when Dumbledore walked up to him. His first thought was immediately, _uh oh. What did I do now? _Then he scolded himself mentally, there was nothing he had done, Dumbledore probably just wanted to tell him something. Then he thought, _tell me what? I hope Hermione's okay, what if something bad happened?_ That thought he quickly pushed away also, if something _had_ happened he would have heard of it. Maybe it was something to do with You-Know-Who.

"Ah, Mr. Malfoy," Dumbledore said smiling at Draco. Draco gave a part smile back and dug his hands into his pockets.

"Have you heard about your manor yet?" Dumbledore asked and Draco raised his eyebrows. He'd almost completely forgotten about that. He shook his head.

"We don't know where your mother is, the manor is completely abandoned, not to mention it was quite thoroughly ransacked and everything of value stolen," he went on to explain, "We believe it was death eaters, we don't know when it happened though. In the fact that they might come back, or might still be there, hiding, and that most of your relatives are missing as well, we can't let you go back there this summer."

"Ah," Draco said, dumbfounded. This was unexpected. His mother, gone. Dead or with the death eaters, a prisoner, he felt his stomach jump a little, or with them? Unlike his father, Draco did care about his mother a little bit, despite her natural airy stuck-up manner. She _was_ his mother.

"Is there any place you can think of that you could go?" Dumbledore asked. Draco's mind immediately lept to Hermione and he bit his lip, he doubted Hermione's parents would want to bother over him all summer, especially if they knew there was something going on between them.

"Could I stay here?" Draco asked.

Dumbledore frowned slightly and tilted his head, "We don't normally allow students to stay during the summer. Most of the teachers go home, so there doesn't tend to be anyone here. Well, if a teacher stays this summer, and they don't mind watching over you, you can stay. We have had this happen a couple of times."

Draco's hopes lifted, he had no idea where'd he'd go if he couldn't stay here, he'd always taken it for granted he'd be able to go back to the Manor.

**4:32**

Up on the tower a breeze whipped around giving Draco a feeling of falling whenever he leaned against the edge. He heard steps on the stairs and opened up the door in the floor as Hermione stepped out. She looked happy and started their conversation by kissing him softly.

"Have a nice day with your parents?" he asked when they came apart.

Hermione nodded taking a deep breath, "I told them, and they were pretty shocked. Then we pretty much talked all day, it felt good to really talk about it."

"Skip all your classes?" he asked teasingly.

"Well, since I've been forbidden to do any homework or class work, just watch the classes and do some stuff, its not like I was missing much at all," Hermione explained, "Kind of drives me crazy, I get what they teach, but then I just have to sit there while everyone does the work. I think they're worried I'll faint again, they want me to take it easy for the rest of the year."

"Not fair, I still have do tons of work," Draco said grinning.

"Ugh, I wish we could trade," Hermione replied smiling brightly then added, "I told my parents about you, and how we were stuck together down there and so on. They want to meet you, I told them I'd go find you then drag you to them."

"Stuck? Drag?" Draco asked, "You make it sound as though as though I'm your slave or something."

Hermione laughed then said, "I really want to tell Harry and Ron about us. I think we should soon, they're getting used to the idea of you as a friend I think. Its hard, to not mention anything about you, hard not telling my friends."

Draco nodded, "We should probably wait a little longer though, we still have a couple weeks of school left."

Then he grinned and added, "We should tell them the last day of school then zip home and give them the summer to sit on it."

Hermione grinned, "Right before we get off the train?"

Draco nodded and Hermione said, "Sounds good to me! I kind of wonder what the expressions on their face will be, you know?"

Draco nodded then laughed, "Before being down there I would always think about ways to get back at you guys, look forward to expressions on your faces when I did something awful. Now here I am thinking similar thoughts, except for completely different reasons."

"We should just tell them, let them rave and rant or whatever, then convince them that, you're not the bad boy you were before," Hermione said thoughtfully as the wind blew her hair around.

"The only question is when, tomorrow, in a week?" Draco wondered then said, "That reminds me, Malfoy Manor was ransacked, so I can't go back there this summer. Hopefully I'm going to stay at Hogwarts for the summer though."

"Maybe you could stay with us," Hermione suggested, "I have seriously no idea what my parents would think. I mean we often let the odd cousin and stuff stay during the summer for various reasons, I don't see why you'd be any different, especially after they meet you and see what a great person you are."

"You flatter me," Draco said smiling then shrugged, "Do you actually think there's a chance of me staying with you this summer? I can see myself having a very lonely miserable summer away from you."

"If they do say no, though, we can also visit," Hermione told him then leaned down to open up the door again, "Come on, time to meet the parents."

**A/N: Shorter chapter than normal, computer froze up a bit yesterday, otherwise this chapter would already be up. Today though my computer is up to speed! **

**Dedications To:**

**Princess Rinoa**

**chickadee77**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Marissa03**

**SkittlesStar25**

**dracohermioneluver**


	24. Quidditch Match

**Friday 8:10 am**

"Definitely fool proof," Sen said looking at the notes and drawings they'd made. Ron nodded in agreement.

"All we need to do now is get the materials, gather up the power, and set it up," she said spreading several pages out in the grass of Firenze's class room.

"Have you talked to anyone else about it yet?" Ron asked then said, "I think we can get that in Hogsmeade."

"Good," Sen said, "And I think its been mentioned. We can't blame them for not doing much in helping, I mean Harry and Ginny are you know, and we know what that's like, same thing with Hermione and Draco- um, except they're, not like Harry and Ginny, I mean, like talking stuff over, the dungeons you know."

Ron nodded, "Yeah I know. I'll talk to them about it at breakfast."

"Okay," Sen said, "So I'll get this stuff and you can get all the other things, and we can meet again Saturday afternoon, is that long enough to find all the right things, do you think?"

"It should," Ron said and started gathering things up. Sen stood up and put the papers back into a folder which she put behind the log that had become the main place in the classroom of their studies.

**8:23 am**

Harry kissed Ginny softly as they headed for breakfast together putting an arm around her. His thoughts had been on Voldemort before. The teachers were investigated what he'd been doing while in the various body's of students. It was steadily getting worse. There wasn't much anyone could do to stop him from taking over people one at a time, except for the individual's will. The teachers were worried he was using a abandoned or secret room to prepare spell's of sorts or gather power, but as of yet, they'd found nothing.

The hallways were abandoned, this being the time where all the early risers had already gone to breakfast and the late risers weren't up yet. He couldn't help but wonder though if anyone already knew about he and Ginny, even though they hadn't said anything. He did feel guilty about not telling his friends, but Ginny told him Ron wouldn't like it, that they should rather ease the idea on them, or wait til nearer to the end of the year.

Ginny glanced up at him and asked, "How are you feeling?"

"Good," Harry answered then added, "Worried, about Voldemort."

Ginny nodded, "Ron and Sen have been working really hard on that. I think they've found a lot of good stuff. Ron mentioned them making a spell, but I don't know if they've finished anything yet."

"I can't help but feel a simple spell won't stop him," Harry said, stating his thoughts.

"I don't think its just a simple spell. I think its very complex," Ginny added, "You're the one who'll get him in the end, but we'll all be there, backing you up."

The clatter of breakfast noises drifted up the hallway and Harry stepped slightly to the side, walking next to Ginny now, instead of against her with their arms entwined around each other. Ron and Sen, along with Hermione, were already at the table. Harry sat down across from them with Ginny and started filling the plate that appeared in front of him.

"Worried about or match today?" Ron asked Harry, "We're against Ravenclaw."

Harry widened his eyes, "I completely forgot."

Ron grinned then said, "Been busy?"

Harry shrugged.

"You guys are going to have to meet my parents also," Hermione said as she finished up the last bit of food on her plate. Ron nodded, in the middle of putting a piece of sausage into his mouth.

"They already met Draco," she continued then paused to take a drink.

"Are they staying the rest of the year?" Ginny asked and Hermione nodded.

"I think that's really good," Ginny continued with a smile.

"The spell is almost done," Sen announced, "Ron and I are just going to get the materials, then the rest is just setting it up and practicing it, until the right time comes."

"Really?" Harry asked a slight note of nervousness in it.

"Don't worry, its foolproof," Sen assured him, catching that note.

"Ah," Harry said and bit his lip then started eating his food, worried not so much about the spells, but about confronting Voldemort.

**5:50 pm**

"Going against Ravenclaw then?" Hermione asked as she, Harry, Ron, Ginny and Sen walked towards the Quidditch field.

Ron nodded then glanced at Harry and said, "We should hurry and get changed. Game starts in ten minutes."

"It doesn't take ten minutes to walk to the locker rooms, they're right there," Hermione said then asked Harry suddenly, "Weren't you going out with Cho for a little bit, she's still on the Ravenclaw team isn't she?"

"Oh her," Ron said grinning, "Harry dumped her."

"I did not!" Harry retorted indignant then said a bit more sheepishly, "Actually, I kind of did, but I wouldn't really use the term dumped. We kind of drifted away, we weren't really meant for each other at all."

"Drifted away, pft," Ron said, "More like one day Cho is being all wimpy and trotting after you, then the next day she's moping around without you, looking all betrayed and stuff."

"She only liked me because she wanted me to replace Cedric or something and thought we could like, I don't know, confide in each other. Since the first person I'd go and confide in would be the girlfriend of a guy who got killed in the whole mess," Harry said sarcastically as though he'd really wanted to say that for a long time.

"Well," Hermione said then added as Harry and Ron entered the locker rooms, "Good luck, win this game for us."

"Shall we go find a seat?" Sen asked speaking up for the first time.

"Did you know about all this?" Hermione asked.

"I hardly even know who Cho is, I really only got to know Harry when I got to know Draco which was only around a month ago so.."

"I think finding a seat is going to be hard," Ginny said and Hermione and Sen followed her gaze to the stands which were almost full.

"I knew we should have come earlier," she said and continued walking then added, "We can always ask some people to move around."

The game started out fairly even with Ravenclaw leading only slight by ten points. The snitch was no where to be seen, only having been spotted once before getting away. The light was fading as two hours into the game with the score of 40 to 130, Ravenclaw in the lead. If the game went on much longer Ravenclaw could win, doubtless of who caught the snitch.

Suddenly a loud shout went up as Harry dived for the a small glimmery spot of gold up near the top of the stands. Harry turned his firebolt around and swerved after it, it moved quickly going around behind the stands but in a moment Harry came back around holding the snitch in his hand. The Ravenclaw's seeker on her old Silver65 didn't have a chance.

The three girls clambered down from the stands to go congratulate Harry and Ron. Though Ron's luck had been awful in guarding the goal post's they'd still won the game. Sweaty, dirty, and happy Harry and Ron went back into the locker rooms while Hermione and Sen headed back up the castle. Ginny said she'd wait for Harry and Ron then meet them in the Great Hall.

Hoping to catch a chance to talk to Draco, Hermione told Sen that she'd come back to the Great Hall in a little bit. In one of the main hallways she leaned against the wall waiting for Draco to walk by on the way back to the common room or on the way to the Great Hall. She spied him after a moment talking to another Slytherin with short black hair and a casual expression on his face.

"Hermione!" he yelled and Hermione stepped out walking next to him as they headed down the hallway.

"This is Cameo," Draco said and Hermione smiled at him uncertainly.

"Greetings padiwan," he said. Hermione glanced at Draco who shrugged.

"Ever seen Star Wars?" he asked with a grin, "It's a muggle movie."

Hermione shook her head then said, "I have heard of it though. A lot of boys who went to my elementary school had seen it. I think my dad has a few of the old figures also. Was that a quote?"

Cameo nodded then started to turn off down another hallway, "I'm going to the library, see you later baby and you too man."

"Baby?" Hermione asked stopping as other students disappeared off to various common rooms and other places.

Draco grinned then said, "He says 'sweet' also."

"New friend?" she asked and Draco nodded.

"Seems way better than Crabbe and Goyle," Hermione told him and Draco laughed.

"They didn't even realize I was back until like 3 days later!" he told her, "Only hung out with them because our parents were friends. All dead now I suppose."

Hermione noticed a slight shadow pass over his face, then he said, "You know, a lot of the death eaters down there were probably innocent wizards under the imperius curse."

Hermione nodded, "A lot of people died, but we can't change that. We and the other prisoners survived though, not all was lost."

She leaned over and kissed him softly and he responded, his lips meeting hers as they brought their arms about each other, closing their eyes, finding peace and love in each other's presence.

Suddenly Hermione heard a slight cough and turned to see Harry followed by Ron, Ginny, and Sen.

**A/N: Yay, everyone finally discovers them! Heh heh, and I made it a cliffhanger, aren't I evil? Thanks for reviewing everyone! Dedications go to:**

**dracohermioneluver**

**CrazyPoet**

**Marrisa03**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Padfootfan**

**Balsam**


	25. Everyone's Reactions

**Friday 8:45**

"Get your hands off her, Malfoy," Harry said, his initial surprise followed by anger. Ginny stepped forward and took Harry's arm.

"Harry!" Hermione said.

"Hermione, do you even realize what happened there, he kissed you! He was obviously pretending to be your friend for all the wrong reasons!" Harry yelled, assuming things.

"I kissed him back, Harry!" Hermione retorted turning and grabbing Draco's hand protectively, "I'm part of it all too!"

"So this has been going on for a while," Harry said his eyes darkening, "And it simply slipped your mind to not tell your closest friends."

"Its none of your business Potter!" Draco said interrupted.

"Draco," Hermione said giving him a look then she turned back to Harry.

"I didn't tell you because I knew your reaction would be just like this, I was planning on talking to you!" Hermione told him then added, "If you can go off and have some affair with Ginny, I don't see why I can't have one with Draco!"

Harry raised his eyebrows and glanced at Ginny, surprised that anyone knew.

"She has a point there," Ron said and Harry looked at Ron incredulously.

Then Ron turned to Ginny and said, "And about that"-

"Oh! Don't you start going on about me and Harry!" Ginny said her turn to get in some yelling, "I'm perfectly old enough to have a boyfriend, and I've already had a few anyway! I don't see how it being Harry makes it any different!"

Ron's ears reddened and he bit his lip, opened his mouth, then closed it again realizing he had no real argument about that.

"You should have told me Harry," he finally said, "You're my best friend, and, Ginny, you're right, you _are_ old enough. Sorry."

"How touching," Draco said then realized that sarcastic remarks were not what everyone needed. Hermione smiled slightly but Harry still looked quite furious with Draco. Ron looked at Draco suspiciously.

"Oh come on you guys! Really! You're acting like little kids!" Hermione said starting to get exasperated at their bickering.

"Well Draco keeps sticking in these comments," Ron started but was immediately silenced with a glare from Hermione.

Draco had to bite his lip to stop from making a retort at Ron reminding himself that they had all the reason to treat him the way they were. He had to show them he'd changed, but it was hard since he was treated no different by them.

"I'm sorry," Draco said, "Its kind of natural to retaliate against you guys. I need to stop, but it'd be nice if you guys could help. Try to treat me better, I have become and am trying to become a better person. You guys know what I was like."

Harry raised an eyebrow but was silent. Draco wanted to shake him and tell him to open his mind a little bit.

Ron spoke up first, "Okay. If Hermione trusts you, I guess I can."

Draco smiled starting to feel like he was going to fit in with the group. Harry continued to remain silent but Ginny said she agreed with Ron.

Harry glanced at Sen who said, "I never knew Draco when he was awful, as you guys say."

Draco kept expecting her to say she'd known about them all along, but realized she was keeping silent not wanting to start another argument between Hermione and Harry. Harry would be angry that someone Hermione barely knew, knew about them long before a close friend knew.

"Well, ah, shall we head to the Great Hall for dinner?" Sen asked breaking the silence. Everyone mumbled phrases of agreement so the group turned and headed back around, Hermione and Draco in the back, Sen and Ron in the front and Harry and Ginny in the middle.

**Saturday 7:24**

Hermione woke up, having slept almost the whole night for once and slipped into her robes, hoping to go to Hogsmeade that day. Down in the common room not many people were up. She spied Harry sitting in one of the chairs flipping through a magazine of some sort.

"Hey Harry," she said sitting down across from him.

"Hi," he said looking a little bit uncomfortable then he blurted out, "Sorry, for yelling, yesterday, about Malfoy."

"Draco," Hermione said, "He doesn't want to be remembered after his father. He really is trying, you know, to be a better person, and he is, Harry."

Harry shrugged, "I don't know, you've spent a lot more time with him, I still feel that old hatred for him whenever I hear his name. I kind of got used to him as a not-enemy or whatever, he has been hanging around a lot..."

Hermione smiled, "Just give him a chance, treat him like you would any person that you didn't really know."

"That's the problem though, I already know him!" Harry said, "And this just doesn't match up with the Malfoy"- "Draco." -"Draco, that I knew. He's never yelled at you or anything?"

Hermione shook her head.

"How can you be sure its not all just an act," Harry protested, "I can very well imagine Mal- Draco doing that in order to, I don't know, take advantage of you."

"Harry! All I'm asking is for you to give him a chance, to be a friend," Hermione argued then said, "I love him Harry. This isn't some silly thing like with Victor Krum, I love him."

Hermione looked at Harry but he averted her gaze looking down at the cover of the magazine, finally he spoke up, "You're my friend Hermione, I love you too, as a friend. I'll try though, Ron said he'd give him a chance, I will too. If he makes one bad move though..."

Hermione grinned and hugged Harry tightly, cutting him off, before stepping back. Harry smiled slowly too then said, "Its nice to have you back. Ron and I nearly died of worry. I really don't mind if you go out with Crabbe or Goyle, just as long as you don't disappear for many months again. Just don't get yourself hurt."

**A/N: I contemplated having Ron being the one who kind of didn't really go along with the whole idea, or both of them, but it didn't really fit, I know Ron's the one who tends to let his anger get out of control, but we've seen Harry blow up a few times also, I can see Harry as the less trusting one of Draco, more than Ron. Anyway, thanks for reviewing! **

**Dedications to:**

**CrazyPoet**

**Balsam**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Saiya-jin Patricia**

**LiLbLuangeL1223**

**Marissa03**

**dracohermioneluver**

**duochang97**


	26. Draco Malfoy Fan Club

**Saturday 7:33**

A sudden sound of footsteps coming from the girl's dormitory ended Hermione's conversation with Harry. Three girls from their year crowded around.

"Is it true?" Paravati asked.

"Is what true?" Hermione asked suspiciously.

"Draco Malfoy!" she said. Hermione blushed and glanced at Harry.

"You're pretty lucky," Lavender put in.

"Yeah, I mean, all along its been, if only he wasn't in Slytherin," the third one said.

"I guess you don't care though!" Paravati said with a grin.

"Well actually, he's changed a lot," Hermione said grinning. Harry raised his eyebrows, apparently he'd never heard of any of this.

"His eyes are to die for," Lavender said sighing softly.

"Don't forget that hair," Paravati reminded her.

"I heard he moves really fast with girls," the third one said giving Hermione a look.

This time Hermione raised an eyebrow, "We've been moving pretty slow so far I guess."

Hermione's face was bright red by now and she looked at Harry who was apparently completely absorbed in magazine.

"I heard that he's really good at well, you know," Lavender said with a giggle.

"Excuse me?" Hermione asked thoroughly embarrassed by now. She'd known a lot of girls thought Draco was hot and all, but never any of these rumors.

"I've heard things from almost all the girls in Slytherin in his year," the third girl said, "They all say they dated him at least once."

Hermione raised her eyebrows.

"So, what's he like?" Paravati asked curiously.

"What's he _like_?" asked Hermione.

All three nodded their heads and the third one said, "You know, personality... is he a good kisser?"

Hermione smiled and said, "Oh, he's really sweet and caring. He's very, in control of himself, you know?"

All three nodded again, absorbing what Hermione told them, so she continued, "He's way better at kissing than Victor Krum."

"You kissed _Krum_?!" Harry interrupted, an incredulous expression on his face.

Hermione grinned, so Harry _was_ listening, and decided to stretch things a bit.

"His, you know, is," Hermione raised her eyebrows, all three giggled. Harry had his nose buried as far into the magazine as possible as he tapped his foot against the ground.

"We haven't done _it_ yet, but there's other things he's good at," Hermione told them mischievously.

Harry leaped up one of his eyelid's twitching slightly and yelled, "You're making it up! I know you are! You're doing it just to get on my nerves!"

Hermione couldn't help it, she burst out laughing. Harry looked so funny, obviously disturbed by what he'd heard. Ron chose to stumble sleepily down the stairs at that time. At the bottom though he looked up opening his eyes fully, seeing a room full of four laughing girls and one very red Harry.

"You don't want to hear what she's been saying Ron!" Harry said pointing a finger at Hermione wildly, "I _know_ she's making it up!"

"You hope I'm making it up you mean," Hermione said grinning wickedly, knowing that Harry wasn't mad, just losing his wits.

"I know it! I know it!" Harry said getting slightly hysterical, "When would you have been able to? When?!"

Ron gave Harry and curious look having no idea what was going on while Harry ranted on, Hermione stopped laughing and gave Harry a worried look.

"Don't hyperventilate," she told him putting a hand on his shoulder, "Of course I was making it up."

"You mean its not true?" the third girl asked, looking a bit disappointed.

"Well the part where I said he was really sweet and caring is true," Hermione told them, "And he _is_ a really good kisser."

Harry took a deep breath and pushed him back into his chair. The three other girls walked over talking in hushed whispers.

"There goes the Draco Malfoy fan club," Hermione told him.

"I didn't even know there was one," Harry said then added, "Rumors like that were the main reason I didn't like the idea of you and Draco."

"Do I dare ask what is going on?" Ron asked sitting down as well. Hermione grinned.

"I just exaggerated some things a bit," Hermione said.

"Okay, I don't want to know," Ron said making up his mind.

Harry finally gave Hermione a resentful look but she could see the beginnings of a smile twitching at the corner of the mouth.

"Good wasn't I?" Hermione asked him.

Harry bit his lip and said, "Just don't scare me like that again. I have a nice good image of the kind of person you are, don't want any bad images mixed in."

"Don't worry, kissing is about all we've done," Hermione said.

"Glad I missed out on this," Ron said, still looking a bit sleepy then looked at Harry, "Care for a game of chess?"

Harry nodded and Hermione stood up deciding to go find Draco before breakfast. As she walked down the hallway she realized that Harry and Ron at least probably believed that she had never done _it_, and actually she hadn't, that didn't mean she wasn't a virgin though. These thoughts of course, stirred up darker memories and she stopped, closing her eyes, willing herself to think of something else. The laughter of the morning washed away faster than Hermione could have imagined and she took a deep breath thinking to herself, I can handle this. Just think of something else.

Hermione started walking again, quickly this time, focusing on what they'd been doing in Herbology the other day. She found herself at the Tower and hurried up the steps, muttering the procedures for growing plants extra fast.

The trap door was open, though Hermione had half expected it to be, and she climbed out to see Draco leaning over the edge, gazing into the distance. He turned around upon hearing her and seeing the expression on her face, brought her up into a soft hug. She leaned against him, breathing in his scent until finally she relaxed.

**A/N: A kind of goofy chapter, you have to have some of those every once in a while though! I can't beleive I got 11 reviews for the last chapter in one day! Thanks! Dedications to:**

**Tega**

**CrazyPoet**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Marissa03**

**Balsam**

**dracohermioneluver**

**JeNny0921**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Snowbear**

**Saiya-jin Patricia**


	27. The Rumors

**Saturday 7:58 am**

"I talked to your parents some more this morning at breakfast," Draco told Hermione when she looked up, "You're lucky to have parents that care about you so much."

Hermione nodded and smiled looking at him then asked, "Are all those rumors about you true?"

"What rumors?" he asked curiously smiling as well.

"Things like you're good in bed, that you sleep around, that you move forward in a relationship really fast," Hermione said casually.

Draco blushed and shook his head, "I wouldn't really know about that. I mean, I've had a few girlfriends, but not more than 3 or 4, and none at the same time."

"Oh?" Hermione asked curious, "Care to tell me?"

"Mainly just Pansy, the first one was this girl way older than me, completely took advantage of me, not that I cared at the time. Pansy was the second, it was mainly her for a few years, then we broke up, cuz she's well, you know, kind of silly, then the other two apparently were madly in love with me, but were even worse than Pansy and didn't really care about me that much," Draco explained.

"Victor Krum was the only boyfriend I've had," Hermione said then asked, "Can I ask a kind of personal question?"

When Draco nodded she continued, "Have you ever, done, oh I'll just say it, had sex?"

Draco blushed slightly again and replied, "Yeah, the first one, dumped me right after, and a few times with Pansy, our relationship was kind of off and on. The third and fourth, I didn't, that's all they wanted though I think."

"I'd never done it, before _they_ raped me," Hermione said, "Though, I think you already knew that."

"I'd always thought you had something going on with Harry or Ron for a long time there," Draco said with a smile, "Then Krum came along and I figured either you weren't with one of them, because you would have gone to the Yule Ball with them then, or you'd dumped them for Krum."

Hermione smiled too then said, "Krum was a bit, I don't know. Ron was really jealous though, I think he _did_ have a bit of a crush on me."

She suddenly laughed and said, "I had a boyfriend in first grade. I thought we were going to marry when we grew up. Of course it only lasted until about second grade and we never kissed or anything like that, it was more like having a friend that was a boy. Everyone would sing that one teasing song.. what was it?"

Draco leaned over and kissed her softly then starting chanting the little tune, "Hermione and Draco sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G."

Hermione grinned remembering the words and she said the next ones with him, "First comes love, then comes marriage"-

Draco suddenly coughed and glanced at her face and Hermione realized why he'd stopped chanting it. She smiled slightly biting her lip and glanced up at the sky, then turned to lean against the tower wall. Draco came over next to her and took her hand as he followed her gaze to the land stretched out before them.

"Beautiful isn't it?" Hermione asked then glanced over at castle behind and below them with other towers jutting up, seemingly random.

"Just like you," Draco said with a smile and squeezed her hand. Hermione laughed as she turned her head to look at him.

Draco leaned over and kissed her, pressing his lips against hers. In response she turned and pulled him closer wanting to be as near to him as possible making him fiercely aware of her, all the places they touched, and his love her. He didn't know what he'd do if he lost her. If she hadn't broken out of her coma-like state... it made him realize how much he truly loved her, she had no faults, absolutely the most amazing person. When the kiss ended she snuggled up against him and mumbled something.

"Hmm?" he asked loving the feel of her in his arms.

"I love you," she told him.

"I love you too," he said running a hand through her hair, which never ceased to fascinate him, though bushy it was still soft and not bad looking at all, quite the opposite.

"Mmm," Hermione said nuzzled his neck softly.

Draco smiled and said, "Stop that, you're tickling me."

Hermione grinned wickedly, "I know."

Draco's response was to kiss her fiercely before easing his tongue between her lips. She parted them allowing him to enter. Slowly at first, then more confidently their tongues moved to a slow intimate tune. Hermione brought her arms around the back of his neck kissing him back passionately, enjoying the taste of him.

Nearly gasping for air they finally broke apart. Hermione grinned and said, "Yummy Draco."

Draco grinned also then laughed feeling the happiness in him rise like a bubble that was about to burst. He lowered his gaze and looked at her face studying the warm flush it had. She looked so much more healthier than he could remember her ever being since they got back.

**Saturday 8:20 am**

At breakfast Draco sat at the Gryfindor table next to Hermione, also managing to convince Cameo to sit there with him, when Sen and Ron came rushing in, worried looks on their faces. Harry looked up startled when they both started talking at the same time.

"Slow down," Ginny said pushing aside her plate.

"A teacher was possessed," Sen said bluntly.

"Who?" Harry asked standing up.

"The guy who teaches Arithmancy," Ron said looking pale.

"For a whole day," Sen continued, "No one knew until he attacked Professor Dumbledore."

"It's time," Ron told them, "We've got to do it now."

"Do what?" Hermione asked their panic catching on.

"Capture him!" Ron nearly yelled banging a fist down on the table, "Send him away once and for all!"

Harry paled slightly wishing he hadn't eaten breakfast, "Right now?"

Sen nodded and Harry pulled his wand out of his pocket a determined look on his face. Ginny stood up as well standing behind him. Hermione forgot about breakfast and stood up along with Draco.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Harry asked, "Let's get this over with."

They followed Sen and Ron down the hallway, everyone unsure on what the outcome of this spell was going to be. Would it work? Would the consequences, if any, be good or bad?

The six students made a grim looking group as they walked down the hallways towards Firenze's classroom where they'd gotten everything ready, including the materials that made a circle and doorway to where they'd send You-Know-Who's soul.

**A/N: Mwahahahahahah! Don't you just love cliff-hangers? You're probably thinking _finally, _she's gotten around to voldemort and stuff. I practically didn't need a plot for this story, enough going on with Draco and Hermione.**

**Dedications to:**

**Ellar Shadow Raven**

**Tega**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Marissa03**

**Balsam**

**dracohermioneluver**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Dracos-girl07**

**Princess Rinoa**


	28. Voldemort

**Saturday 9:00 am**

"Okay everyone stand at one point of the pentagram," Sen instructed looking at the large pentagram drawn in the grass with white powder, approximately 5 yards long. Different color candles burned endlessly at each point as well.

"Harry," Sen said, "You go into the center. You'll be the one doing the main part of the spell, its really simple, you won't be alone either, we're going to try to do a total mind link so we'll all be helping you."

"The spell is easy enough," Ron said, "But you can do a mind link without a spell after a few months practice, but since we've been working on mind shielding and stuff Sen thought we should just do the spell."

Harry nodded nervously as he stepped into the center, everyone else going to separate points. Sen carried a few odd objects and set them at each point of the pentagon formed in the center of the pentagram.

"Those form the portal to the after world," Sen said, "Where his soul should have gone if he hadn't had all those protections on it."

"Its those protections we have to break through," Ron told them.

"But first we have to summon him," Sen continued, "It's a slightly different spell to summon something to a certain place rather than to you directly. The words are _Anandla-Eyad_. Then we'd just add on You-Know-Who's name."

"Voldemort you mean," Harry said and Sen nodded.

"Why don't we practice saying it a few times," Ron said looking worried, "As long as you say them right, it should work, especially with six of us."

"Does Dumbledore know about this?" Hermione asked wondering if this was going to turn out to be a stupid idea. They could all get killed quite easily. No one would willingly call You-Know-Who to the same room they were in, unless of course they were a death eater. She narrowed her eyes and bit her lip.

Ron nodded, "He's been doing all he can, but I guess he trusts us. Dumbledore's power is in magic, not in the supernatural. This is one situation where he isn't much help."

Hermione nodded, understanding. After mumbling the words over and over they decided to start.

"Okay," Sen whispered, "Everyone close your eyes then we'll start saying the spell. Try to imagine Voldemort's soul being called to this room, to the center of the circle. Then once his soul takes a form, it should be a whispy like see-through thing, not solid at all, you say _seyalif, _that creates a bubble on the pentagram, he won't be able to leave. If we don't do it quickly though he might go to one our minds. This is where we have to remember how to shield our minds. A soul isn't that strong, even Voldemort's soul and I think you've all had enough practice. Then you have to imagine yourself, well, pushing him into the portal, which is where Harry stands. We form the shield to stop him from leaving, the bubble spell. Ron will do the spell that will link our minds, that way Harry can share all of our strength, like how water and flour and sugar and stuff all separate aren't anything, but together they make a cake. Bad example, but anyway, the main thing is not to let him get away. We can hold him here until he weakens if we can't push him into the portal right away."

"Like a cake would stop Voldemort," Ron said with a hesitant smile.

"That's why it was an example Ron," Sen reminded him with a smile.

Hermione was just barely able to remember all this, but knew that with the mind link Sen and Ron would be able to guide what was going to happen. Her heart pounded loudly and she glanced at Draco's face. He looked just as scared as she was, but he wasn't backing down. None of them were, no matter how afraid they were, this was just too important.

"All right," Ron said, "Let's begin."

Sen started saying the words to the summoing spell and pointed her wand at the center of the circle, slowly the others all followed her example. Quietly at first, their chanting grew steadly louder until they were all nearly shouting. The room suddenly darkened, or had it been happening gradually?, and the candles flames grew higher, the objects at the center each glowing a different color. In that same instant the grass beneath the center suddenly turned shimmery the portal starting to open.

Hermione nearly stopped chanting when she heard a faint whispering slide through out the room almost as though many beings were just beyond the portal. She shivered slightly and chanted louder trying to feel Voldemort's soul being summoned to this room, to the pentagram.

In a few minutes the room had gone from bright to pitch black, the candles being the only source of light, illuminating their faces in a deathly way. A faint grayness suddenly started to materialise in the center next to Harry. Hermione squinted then blinked as it became more solid taking on the basic shape of a human.

Sen stopped chanting the summoing words and changed to the shielding words. Once again everyone slowly followed until Hermione almost felt a shield go up around the pentagram.

"This is it," Sen said and Hermione suddenly felt a blaring sense of openness in her mind then saw the room from each angle and felt the power of their magics centering in Harry.

"Keep your mind shielded, this is where we're going to be weakest," Sen whispered as they continued chanting, holding Voldemort there.

Hermione whipped up the mental stone wall around her head almost the same instant she felt something ice cold touch it. She hardened the wall and slowly felt the coldness drift away, only to feel it touch Ginny's mind, linger only briefly on Sen's, then move onto Draco and finally to Ron.

Sen mumbled something and suddenly Hermione wasn't a part of everyone's mind they were all converged in Harry's. She felt Harry's fear, his thoughts of facing Voldemort before, and nearly cried out at the slight onrush of what he was thinking. The mental link didn't allow her to look into her memories, only his current thoughts. She almost felt that their power matched Voldemort's. Harry started speaking a strange voice, almost a mix of everyone's and she felt a strong pull towards the portal.

The grayness had now become very solid, its feet touching the ground and the shape of the figure quite clear, color even starting to come in. She felt Sen frown and yell another spell, then heard her thinking that he was even stronger than they'd thought. That in the bodies of the students he'd been taking their power and building them up somewhere. Where though? How? They had to hope to be able to defeat not only Voldemort's soul's power but also the power he'd gathered. Sen's thoughts told her that he would have had to have something that his power was kept in, a sacred box or jar, something like that would have to be hidden, a abandoned room.

They pushed mentally at the almost alive looking figure, trying to get it to move into the portal, but he pushed back, and then started being pulled apart, the solidness disappearing as though wind was pulling it into the portal. Keep pushing, Sen thought.

Then, something felt wrong, Hermione felt her own soul started to be pulled away from its body towards the portal as well. If they got too far in it would completely pull them in! Hermione jerked back almost at the same time everyone else did. A noise like a gun-shot sounded throughout the winds and suddenly, the lights flickered back on and the portal closed up.

"Is he gone?" someone asked, Hermione was too dazed to think about who.

"No, he was too strong, he got away," another voice sounded scared and worried.

A slight tremor went through-out the school and the lights flickered then went out again, once again the candles being the only source of light.

**A/N: Two nice long action chapters! Not as fun as romance packed chapters, but fun neverthe less. There was soo much I had to put in before Voldemort attacked, I was actually planning on one or two more chapters before these ones.. but I guess I'll save them for the third one, if it works out. **

**Dedications to:**

**Dracohermioneluver**

**duochang97**

**shortsinger**

**Marissa03**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Tega**

**CrazyPoet**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**Dreammergurl2007**

**Snowbear**


	29. Final Battle

**Saturday 9:30 am**

A slow chill gripped the castle suddenly as Hermione once again felt his presence, and felt as though he was trying to draw power of them all.

"He's very powerful," Sen said in a dazed voice as the candles too went out filling the room with blackness. Then, almost as suddenly as the blackness had covered the school, the light came back and the candles flickered back on.

"A brief show of power, perhaps?" Ginny asked her eyes wide.

"I need a box," Sen said, "A wooden one. Made out of ancient oak wood."

"We should be able to get that at Hogsmeade," Hermione told her, feeling that all of them were in a bit of a shocked state.

"Why?" Ron asked.

"To put him in, he's too smart and strong to be pulled into the portal," Sen explained, "If we can trap his soul in a box, we should be then able to burn the box within a protective circle and the ashes will fall into the portal which will drag him with it, infusing him with the ashes."

"Plan B?" Draco asked shakily and Sen nodded.

"I had hoped we wouldn't need it though," she said grimly, "I can get to Hogsmeade and back in about fifteen minutes, who wants to come?"

"I will," Ron said.

"We all will," Harry told her fiercely, but Sen shook her head.

"We don't want to attract attention. Whatever Voldemort was planning on doing, he's probably going to do it now. Which is actually good, because we've forced him to do it now, and not when he was ready," Sen said.

Ron and Sen stood up and Sen told them to keep the candles going and protect the circle. Then they were gone.

Ron jogged through the hallways after Sen when suddenly Snape stepped out from around a corner stopping Ron and Sen in their tracks. He frowned nastily.

"I was looking for you, I knew that you and friends had something to do with this, meddling in powers greater than you can comprehend once again," he said giving them a glare before continuing, "You'll be coming with me. Dumbledore will handle this. And, 25 points from each of your houses."

Ron gaped as he felt his face get hot with anger. Snape didn't even have any proof it was them! They had to get to Hogsmeade, otherwise Voldemort would do whatever it was he was going to do, Dumbledore had already said there wasn't anything he could do, it was up to them!

"No we're not," Ron told Snape, "We're not coming with you."

Then he grabbed Sen's hand and ran down the opposite hallway, leaving a dumbfounded Snape behind them.

Sen led Ron to the witch's hump and tapped it saying the words to make it open then clambered in. Ron climbed in after and they set off through the tunnel.

"How'd you know about that?" Ron asked.

Sen shrugged then said, "I think I picked it up from one of you. All people tend to broadcast their thoughts, sometimes I pick them up, in dreams too. Last night I dreamt I came here and said those words and ran through this tunnel to Hogsmeade."

"Wow, neat," Ron exclaimed then broke into a jog as Sen started running. A few moments later they came to the trap door and Sen pushed it open. They climbed out and hurried up into the shop then outside. The streets were almost empty, apparently the tremor had been felt here as well. Ron glanced over towards where Hogwarts castle loomed in the distance. A darkness seemed to be collecting over it, making the sunny day seem very dismal.

"Let's hurry then," Ron told Sen and she nodded hurrying down the street for a wood shop. Spying one down another street they ran towards it and pushed open the door. Five minutes later they left Sen carrying a almost fragile looking wooden box, so old it was. Though Sen had said it didn't matter how old it was or how weak it was, the spells would make it strong. The climbed back into the trap door just as Ron saw clouds cover the sky outside the shop, darkening everything. He closed the trap door and felt his way through the tunnel after Sen, who had not bothered with Lumos this time.

Hermione, Draco, Harry, and Ginny all stood up abruptly when Ron and Sen entered back into Firenze's classroom.

Sen set the box down then pulled out a knife and started engraving all sorts of symbols all over the box in a hurried manner.

"I want you guys to point your wands at each of these symbols and infuse them with magic, just send a bolt into each symbol," Sen told them. Almost immediately raw white magic started flying from their wands hitting the symbols. They glowed brightly they faded to a pale white glow.

When they were finished Sen set the box in the center of the circle and took a deep breath, "Okay same thing as before. This time we're not going to combine our minds, we all need our individual strength to hold him. Harry, you'll shut the lid once he's in. You should be able to close it by thinking, so you needn't worry about latching it or anything."

A strange sort of calm settled over them, fear so strong, it wasn't quite fear. There was some banging on the door of the classroom but they ignored and once again started calling Voldemort.

A large darkness seemed to enter the room, and Hermione realized that the lights hadn't gone out, the darkness had simply blotted them out. A intense chill made Hermione shiver, raising goose bumps on her arms and she quickly shielded her mind then said the words to turn the pentagram into a shield hearing the others do the same. This time, with no mind link, she felt very much alone. Harry yelled several words and Hermione felt Voldemort pull back and used her own magic to hold him. Then a solid form stepped down out of the air and held up a wand.

"That's impossible," Sen whispered.

Harry held up his wand as well, prepared to dual. Hermione remembered the prophecy, the Harry or Voldemort would die, one defeating the other. Voldemort was supposed to be dead, but was he really? Or just halfway dead, like he'd been for those thirteen years. Hermione brought up her own wand as well and willed Harry strength, willing her own magic to join his, as she felt the others doing the same. Magic also flowed from Voldemort as blasts of colors shot from his wand and Harry's, exploding when the hit each other.

Then she saw Harry fall, she yelled out and nearly ran to him, before remembering that she had to stay where she was, to hold the bubble shield. Voldemort walked over to where Harry lay on the ground then, she saw Harry's arm move and heard him whisper one final spell, at the same time she raised her own wand and yelled a spell as well. Six different spells hit Voldemort all at once then she saw Harry's spell separate him, his form turning back into mist. Then it was sucked into the box and Harry snapped it shut. The lights took focus again in the room just as Hermione's eyes clouded over black, exhausted from the battle.

**A/N: To duochang97: I did realize that Dumbledore probably would have drawbacks about letting students do the whole Voldemort thing, but a story is a story. Its hard to keep everything just as it is in the books. I think I did put in something about why Dumbledore couldn't do anything to Voldemort in the state he was in. Also I don't think I gave Ron more power, just stronger mental capabilites, if you didn't notice he'd been learning a lot more from Sen than anyone else, and spending more time with her while his friends were off doing other things. :-P **

**To all reveiwers: if you see something being more unrealistic than need please say so in reviews! I try to keep my stories as realistic as possible, but everyone misses things! **

**Anyway, second to last chapter! I've started a part 3 but I'm not going to put it up until I have enough chapters to assure myself it'll be long enough to actually be a part 3. So you can expect it in about a month or so. I'm not sure how long. **

**Dedications:**

**Balsam**

**duochang97**

**LiLbLueangeL1223**

**dracohermioneluver**

**Marissa03**

**bluefiredragon4131**

**CrazyPoet**

**Snowbear**

****


	30. Epilouge

**Monday 3:20 pm**

Ron and Sen sat on the rocks at the edge of the lake resting their feet in the water. Ron's hair was soaking, they'd just been swimming as a escape from the heat.

On impulse Ron leaned over and kissed Sen softly on the lips. A moment later he leaned back blushing furiously, the tips of his ears turning red. Sen laughed then blushed as well.

"I didn't know you felt that way about me," she said accusingly.

"Neither did I," Ron told her.

Sen grinned and bit her lip then said, "Thanks for helping so much with all the planning. You did really great."

"You were amazing when we were against Voldemort," Ron said, no longer afraid to say his name, knowing that there was no way he was coming back.

"Shall we continue swimming?" Sen asked looking at the cool inviting water.

Ron nodded then, before slipping back in asked, "So, do you want to go to Hogsmeade, like the Three Broomsticks or something, tonight?"

"Is this a date?" Sen asked mischievously.

Ron blushed again said, "I guess you can call it that."

"Okay," Sen said then pushed herself into the water. A moment later Ron got in after her swimming out into the deeper water.

* * *

Harry and Ginny sat on the dock that was a bit away from the rocks, talking softly and kissing.

"What do you think you're going to do?" Ginny asked now that Harry was a legal wizard.

Harry shrugged, "I got an invitation to come to tryouts for seeker position of a few national and international quidditch teams."

"Really?" Ginny asked raising her eyebrows, "So you're going to do that then?"

"I think I want to go to college though too, learn more magic you know," Harry said, "I could probably do both though, I mean, Victor Krum was still in school when he was on a quidditch team."

Ginny nodded, "You should do that then. I still have another year at Hogwarts to go though."

"I'll visit often," Harry said, "I'll got a college very close."

"Good," Ginny said. Harry leaned over and kissed her softly on the lips then leaned back to watch the sky.

* * *

Hermione and Draco stood at the top of the tower watching as other students splashed around in the lake. It was the last day of school and there was to be a great feast tonight. Dumbledore had burned the box successfully while all six of them had been asleep in the hospital wing. Gryfindor won the house cup again, as they got 200 points for defeating Voldemort and Ravenclaw and Slytherin only got 50 each. 

"Where are you going to go this summer?" Hermione asked Draco as she leaned back against him.

Draco shrugged, "I don't know. Dumbledore will probably find some distant cousin of mine for me to stay with."

"I'll miss you," Hermione said and wiped her eyes, "You'll have to come and visit often, I don't think I could stand being apart from you for more than a day."

Draco nodded and Hermione glanced up to see a tear trickle down his cheek. She wiped it away finding herself near tears as well at the thought of leaving Draco.

"I love you," she told him, "Just remember that. We'll see each other next year. You're planning on taking another year as well?"

Draco nodded then said, "I love you too. The slytherins have decided I'm allowed to be a Slytherin again. So next year I won't be as excluded."

Hermione grinned, "That's good."

Draco nodded again then said, "The past few days seem very hazy. The battle seemed very unreal, you know what I mean?"

"Yes," Hermione said then suddenly grinned, "My parents already know you, you could probably come stay with us for the summer!"

"Do you think they'd let me then?" Draco asked.

"Sure, they know you're my boyfriend and they're okay with it," Hermione said, "Once they know that you don't have anywhere to go for the summer they'll practically invite you! We have a guest room that's been unused for like years. You'll love it, our house is huge, we have a pool too. Its kind of out in the country but its near a city, no skyscrapers or anything, but its still a city. There's a mall and a movie theater..."

"Skyscraper? Mall? Movie theater?" Draco asked not knowing what any of these things were.

"Time to learn how fun a muggle's life can be," Hermione said with a grin then laughed as Draco gave her a slight hug. He laughed also feeling his spirit's lift suddenly, maybe the summer wasn't going to be so bad.

He leaned down and kissed her passionately looking forward to what the future would bring.

**A/N: Yup, horribly short little epilouge. You can probably look forward to a third one. I'll hopefully have it out within a month. The end of the story! Its so sad! gets a control on self Yeah so, dedications to:**

**duochang97**

**hedwigmail**

**bluefiredragon4131**

**CrazyPoet**

**Princess Rinoa**

**Balsam**

**Marissa03**

**Snowbear**

****


End file.
